NASA shared an image on Instagram that shows the celestial body’s uncanny resemblance to dumplings. The US space agency asked netizens what they thought was shown in the image. The object imaged by the Cassini spacecraft turned out to be Saturn’s innermost moon, called Pan.
The image shows two images of a dumpling-like object. They were taken from two different angles. (Instagram/@nasa)
“Ravioli, pierogi, empanada… What do you see? There are no wrong answers,” NASA wrote, posting a photo showing Pan from two different angles. The space agency shared more about this month in its headline.
“Pan, the innermost of Saturn’s known moons, orbits the planet inside a crack in one of Saturn’s rings. It completes an orbit every 13.8 hours at an altitude of 83,000 miles (134,000 km),” they wrote on Instagram.
“The ridge around Pan’s equator is similar to Saturn’s moon Atlas and gives the moon its distinctive dumpling shape,” they added.
NASA added that the moon was first discovered by MR Showalter in 1990 using images taken by the Voyager 2 spacecraft. These recent images of Pan were taken by the Cassini spacecraft as it passed within 15,300 miles (24,600 km) of the moon. It is also the spacecraft’s closest encounter with Pan.
The space agency concluded the post with a description of the image. “Two black and white images of Saturn’s moon, Pan. The two images were taken from different perspectives: the image on the left looks like it was taken above the Moon, while the image on the right looks like it was taken below it. The moon has a flat ridge around its center and lines that appear to have been scratched across its surface,” the description reads.
Check out NASA’s interesting post about Saturn’s moon Pan here:
The post was shared eight hours ago. The post has since garnered more than 2.3 million likes. The sharing also prompted people to post different comments.
“A macaron dripping with cream,” one Instagram user joked. “Those are tortellini,” joined another. “It’s obviously a space creature from Star Trek TNG that was draining energy from their ship and they helped it to be born,” added a third. “A frying pan and a pancake,” wrote a fourth.
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Source: newstars.edu.vn