East-West Asymmetry of Saturn's Ring

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics

Scientific paper

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Scientific paper

A spectrophotometric comparison of the eastern and western parts of Saturn's ring was made using the photographs taken with the 50-in. reflector of the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory during 5 oppositions from 1968 to 1972. The excess of brightness, observable — sometimes at the east, sometimes at the west — appears to be due to the following effects: the eastern excess of brightness, which does not depend on wavelength but changes with time and decreases with opening the ring (the Schönberg-Fessenkov effect) and the western excess of brightness, which depends on wavelength, is best of all noticeable in the shortwave part of the spectrum but does not depend on the epoch of observations. The eastern effect can be explained by the fact that water vapour condensed on the ring particles during their transitions throughout the Saturn shadow and they become brighter at the east after going out of the shadow. The western effect is like to photometric peculiarities of Iapetus. This shows that one more field, non-gravitational one, influences the ring particles as well. It might be that the magnetic field provokes the orientation of the particles with respect to Saturn's surface. The difference in magnetic properties of particles can produce an asymmetry of settling dust and result in darkening the leading hemisphere of large particles.

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