PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS AND NON-KEPLERIAN ORBITAL MOTION OF 'PROPELLER' MOONS EMBEDDED IN SATURN'S RINGS

Journal Article · Sun Aug 01 00:00:00 EDT 2010 · Astrophysical Journal Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/2041-8205/718/2/L92· OSTI ID:21451016

Tiscareno, Matthew S; Burns, Joseph A; Hedman, Matthew M; Milano, Anthony J; Evans, Michael W ^[1]; Sremcevic, Miodrag ^[2]; Beurle, Kevin; Cooper, Nicholas J ^[3]; Porco, Carolyn C; Spitale, Joseph N; Weiss, John W ^[4]

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1. Department of Astronomy, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853 (United States)
2. Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, University of Colorado at Boulder, 392 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309 (United States)
3. Astronomy Unit, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, London E1 4NS (United Kingdom)
4. CICLOPS, Space Science Institute, 4750 Walnut Street, Boulder, CO 80301 (United States)

We report the discovery of several large 'propeller' moons in the outer part of Saturn's A ring, objects large enough to be followed over the 5 year duration of the Cassini mission. These are the first objects ever discovered that can be tracked as individual moons, but do not orbit in empty space. We infer sizes up to 1-2 km for the unseen moonlets at the center of the propeller-shaped structures, though many structural and photometric properties of propeller structures remain unclear. Finally, we demonstrate that some propellers undergo sustained non-Keplerian orbit motion.

• OSTI ID: 21451016
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal Letters, Vol. 718, Issue 2; Other Information: DOI: 10.1088/2041-8205/718/2/L92; ISSN 2041-8205
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTROPHYSICS
COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
MOON
ORBITS
SATURN PLANET
SOLAR SYSTEM EVOLUTION
STABILITY
EVOLUTION
PLANETS
SATELLITES