Other
Scientific paper
Dec 1996
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1996icar..124..677s&link_type=abstract
Icarus, Volume 124, Issue 2, pp. 677-689.
Other
5
Scientific paper
Voyager observations of Saturn's innermost D Ring reveal a variety of structures from narrow rings to broad, wave-like patterns. Two narrow ringlets fall at radii of 67,580 +/- 10km and 71,710 +/- 10km, while a broader, somewhat fainter feature falls at 73,145 +/- 10km these are identified as D68, D72, and D73, respectively. D68 and D72 are only marginally resolved, with widths of <=40 km, and show no evidence for eccentricities or longitudinal variations. The region between D68 and D72 is characterized by fainter material and a dominant wavelength of 300 km; the region outside D72 shows a 130km wavelength. The ring's inner boundary is 66,000 km. Photometric modeling reveals that 89% +/- 4% of D72's opacity is composed of dust obeying a relatively flat power-law size distribution, or else particles generally larger than 10 μm in radius; the remaining 11% is in much larger bodies. D72's radially integrated opacity is ~10 m. Little photometric data is available for the other regions of the D Ring, but what there is indicates that the dust size distribution is very variable throughout the system, possibly on spatial scales as small as ~300 km. D68 has an integrated opacity of ~1 m, whereas the remainder of the system has normal opacities of ~10^-5. The dynamical implications of these results are discussed. It is proposed that D68 and D72 are likely to be results of the fragmentation of small moonlets; the viscous spreading rates in these faint rings are sufficiently low that no confinement mechanism is required. Additional source bodies for the observed dust are probably scattered throughout the system.
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