Year: 2016-17
Grade: 5-6
City: Maracaibo
Teachers: Julio Bermudez, Eglee de Wilson,,Euro Carruyo,Jorge Aldana,Carlos Solorzano, Efrain Urdaneta, and Jesus Perozo
Target: Saturn's Hexagon
Team Members:
Lermith Biarreta LICEO LOS ROBLES, Maracaibo
Maria Biaretta ALTAMIRA
Ynes Monteverde Altamira
Carlota Suarez Altamira
Aria Matos Altamira
Adriana Matos Altamira
Isabel Delgado Altamira
Santiago Soto Liceo Los Robles
Rafael Mata Liceo Los Robles
"Why did our team chose Objective 3? Because our team has been puzzled for months trying to figure out a solution to the mystery of Saturn's north pole. Since 1981 and thanks to the Voyager missions the scientific community has been pondering on the improbable existence of a perpetual hexagonal pattern made of clouds in that northernmost zone, which seemed like a formation too unnaturally perfect to be real.
So big that 4 planet Earths could fit inside. This problem became even bigger in 2009 after being visited by the Cassini probe in 2006, when scientists detected a change in colors from blue to yellow, accordingly, as we read that a group of Oxford University scientists designed an experiment in which given certain conditions, liquids rotating at different velocities on the same axis can present regular geometrical patterns with the hexagon being the most common.
This experiment was criticized but not discarded as a possible explanation. Our group anyhow made a similar experiment with a spinning bowl in which we poured chemical components such as water, alcohol, ammonia, hydrogen peroxide, oil and a couple hair dye creams. We then applied infrared light to the rotating bowl and observed that the geometrical patterns varied with different rotating speeds.
Our experiment was published on the Facebook page of our Los Robles astronomy club. We suggest more constant photographical observations of Saturn's pole until the last minute before destroying the Cassini probe in order to obtain more data specially on cloud movements, kinds of gases, temperatures, currents and so on. This is a unique phenomena never observed in other planets!"
