Peculiar rainbows in Saturn's E ring: Uncovering luminous bands near Enceladus

2025/02/25 by Niels Rubbrecht, Rubbrecht, Niels, Stéphanie Cazaux +11 · 1 voice
Physics and Astronomy · #Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP) #FOS: Physical sciences #astro-ph.EP

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2502.18028

arxiv published 2025/02/25 · arxiv updated 2025/06/06

Abstract

We report observations of stripe-like features in Enceladus' plumes captured simultaneously by Cassini's VIMS-IR and ISS NAC instruments during flyby E17, with similar patterns seen in VIMS-IR data from flyby E13 and E19. These parallel stripes, inclined at approximately 16^∘ to the ecliptic and 43^∘ to Saturn's ring plane, appear continuous across images when projected in the J2000 frame. A bright stripe, most visible at wavelengths around 5 μm, acts as the zeroth-order diffraction peak of a reflection grating with an estimated groove spacing of 0.12-2.60 mm, while adjacent stripes are attributed to higher-order diffraction peaks. We suggest that this light-dispersing phenomenon originates from an inclined periodic structure within Saturn's E ring. This structure, constrained between Saturn's G ring and Rhea's orbit, likely consists of fresh ice particles supplied by Enceladus' plumes.

Discussions

• Now I am wondering about the possibility of rainbows on Jupiter and Saturn. But observing those would require dropping another Galileo probe in just the right spot. If we strain the definition, there [bsky, 4 points, 1 comments]

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