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Saturn: Journey to a Ringed World - Spotlight: Why go to Saturn?

Saturn: Journey to a Ringed World - Spotlight: Why go to Saturn?
Published: December 16, 2004

Saturn: Journey to a Ringed World - Spotlight: Why go to Saturn?

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​On the final orbit, Cassini will plunge into Saturn fighting to keep its antenna pointed at Earth as it transmits its farewell. In the skies of Saturn, the journey ends, as Cassini becomes part of...
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Short animation depicting Cassini's entry in the atmosphere.
Cassini's Final Plunge
The Cassini mission’s epic 13-year exploration of Saturn is coming to a close. On Sept. 15, the spacecraft will make a planned plunge into the atmosphere of Saturn in order to protect pristine icy ...
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Computer generated animations, interviews and real images showing highlights of the Cassini mission.
A Journey's End
Oct. 15, 2012 update: check out the top voted images for the 15th anniversary of the launch. http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/cassinifeatures/feature20120926/ Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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Cassini Shining Moment artwork
Cassini Shining Moments
Diagram of the Cassini spacecraft and Huygens probe.
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Cassini Diagram No. 6
This graphic shows the trajectories for the Cassini spacecraft during its flybys of the icy moon Enceladus through the 21st planned targeted encounter. With the exception of E-12, E-13, and E-16...
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Diagram showing the relative position of the close Enceladus fly-bys E-11 through E-21.
Cassini's E-12 through E-21 Trajectories
A labeled diagram of the Dawn spaccraft.
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Diagram of spacecraft.
Dawn Spacecraft Diagram No. 1
This graphic depicts the interplanetary flight path beginning with launch from Earth on 15 October 1997, followed by gravity assist flybys of Venus (26 April 1998 and 24 June 1999), Earth (18 Augus...
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Interplanetary Trajectory
Interplanetary Trajectory
These three posters imagine future tourism possibilities based on the rich history of Saturn exploration from the twin Voyager's Grand Tour to the epic discoveries made by the Cassini-Huygens missi...
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Colorful, whimsical travel posters envision of future where the solar system is open to exploration.
Visions of the Future: Saturn Tour
Artist's rendition of our solar system. Not to scale. 
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Fanciful illustration of the bodies in our solar system all lined up.
Our Solar System (Artist's Concept)
Pan Found!
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Pan Found!
Pan Found!
MOPITT's monthly average of global concentrations of tropospheric carbon monoxide at an altitude of about 12,000 feet, in April 2000 (left) and April 2014.
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Map of global carbon monoxide concentrations
Mapping Carbon Monoxide
Diagram of the Cassini spacecraft and Huygens probe.  
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Diagram of the Cassini spacecraft and Huygens probe.
Cassini Diagram No. 8
This 2001 poster was created with the help of student artists in Los Angeles early in the Cassini mission. It depicts the mythological story of Saturn combined with images of space exploration.
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This poster depicts the mythological story of Saturn combined with images of space exploration.
Cassini: Unveiling the Myth
On July 19, 2013, in an event celebrated the world over, NASA's Cassini spacecraft slipped into Saturn's shadow and turned to image the planet, seven of its moons, its inner rings -- and, in the ba...
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Saturn system with planets annotated
The Day the Earth Smiled (with planets annotated)
This graphic shows the trajectory for the Cassini spacecraft during its flyby of the icy moon Enceladus on Aug. 11, 2008. At closet approach Cassini will be 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the surfac...
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Graphic showing the trajectory for the Cassini spacecraft during its flyby of the icy moon Enceladus on Aug. 11, 2008.
Enceladus Flyby Trajectory – Aug. 11, 2008
Jean Dominique Cassini (1625-1712) discovered Saturn's moons Iapetus, Rhea, Tethys, and Dione. In 1675, Cassini discovered that Saturn's rings are separated into two parts by a gap. The gap is now ...
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Jean Dominique Cassini
Jean Dominique Cassini
The Cassini spacecraft views Saturn with a selection of its moons in varying sizes. Saturn's largest moon, Titan, is in the center of the image. Titan is 5,150 kilometers, or 3,200 miles, across...
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The Cassini spacecraft views Saturn with a selection of its moons in varying sizes.
Moons Small to Large
This mosaic, made from radar images obtained by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, shows mountainous terrain on Saturn's moon Titan in the moon's northern hemisphere, north of the Aaru region. The annotate...
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A mosaic of mountainous terrain on Titan
Mountains North of Aaru on Titan
+ Video Launch Page The window at left shows the field-of-view of the prime instrument during Cassini's flyby Mar. 12, 2008, The right-hand windows show the view from the instrument boresights.
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Computer generated views of the Enceladus flyby
Enceladus Flyby (Fields of View) -- March 12, 2008
    Topography on Titan October 28, 2004 Full-Res: PIA06989   This graph, produced using preliminary altimetry data from Cassini's radar instrument, show...
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Topography on Titan
Topography on Titan
This illustration created by Cassini's mission planning team shows the closest approaches - periapses - of the spacecraft during the final two phases of the mission.
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Illustration showing orbit tracks that go both inside and outside Saturn's rings.
Cassini's Final Orbits
Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Ca...
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Diagram of Cassini
Diagram of the Cassini Spacecraft
+ Unannotated Version The northern and southern hemispheres of Enceladus are seen in these polar stereographic maps, mosaicked from the best-available Cassini clear-filter images. Each map is...
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The northern and southern hemispheres of Enceladus are seen in these polar stereographic maps, mosaicked from the best-available Cassini clear-filter images.
Enceladus Polar Maps - December 2011 -- South -- Annotated
This image shows the surprise that startled Cassini scientists on the composite infrared spectrometer team when they got their first look at the infrared (heat) radiation from the south pole of Sat...
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Enceladus Temperature Map
Enceladus Temperature Map
Christiaan Huygens (1629-1695) discovered Saturn's satellite Titan. He was also the first to clearly see the planet's rings and to explain their appearance over time. Huygens made other significa...
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Christiaan Huygens
Christiaan Huygens

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