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Thursday, October 28, 2010

Photo: Saturn Moon May Have Rings -- A First


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Saturn's moon Rhea (left) sports a thin ring of loosely packed material in an artist's conception.

A new study of data from the Cassini spacecraft shows that electrons are mysteriously absent in a region extending outward from Rhea on each side to about eight times the moon's diameter.

Although no one has actually seen rings, astronomers think a disk of debris that absorbs charged particles is the most likely explanation for the moon's missing electrons.

Image courtesy NASA/JPL/JHUAPL