Cassini Radio Science Observations of Density Waves in Saturn's Rings

Details Cassini Radio Science Observations of Density Waves in Saturn's Rings Cassini Radio Science Observations of Density Waves in Saturn's Rings

Aug 2006

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2006iaujd..10e..11m&link_type=abstract

Progress in Planetary Exploration Missions, 26th meeting of the IAU, Joint Discussion 10, 21-22 August 2006, Prague, Czech Repub

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Scientific paper

Saturn's ring system is an elegant celestial mechanical laboratory for studying the interactions between a host of small and large moons, and the rings themselves. Resonances between the satellites and the ring particles result in spiral density waves whose detailed characteristics can be used to determine the physical properties of the rings. Over the past year, the Cassini Radio Science Team has obtained nearly a dozen exquisite radial profiles of the structure of Saturn's rings from occultations at three radio wavelengths (0.9 cm, 3 cm, and 12 cm), at sub-km resolution, after correction for the effects of diffraction. The optical depth profiles of the rings are replete with density waves produced by Mimas, Janus, Epimetheus, Prometheus, Pandora, and even smaller moons. Using wavelet decomposition as well as direct model fitting, we have determined the surface mass density and viscosity of the ring particles from weak (linear) density waves, primarily in the A ring. These are essential ingredients for dynamical models of the rings that include the effects of self-gravity and inelastic particle collisions. Future radio science occultation experiments throughout the Cassini orbital tour of Saturn will probe the rings at a range of ring opening angles, providing both additional measurements of density waves and other ring features.

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