July 2005
Cassini finds recent, unusual geology on Enceladus
New detailed images taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft of the south polar region of Saturn's moon Enceladus reveal distinctive geological features, and the most youthful terrains of any seen on Enceladus. These findings point to a very complex evolutionary history for Saturn's brightest, whitest world.
Cassini's flyby on July 14 brought it within 175 kilometers (109 miles) of the surface of the icy moon. The close encounter revealed a landscape near the south pole littered with house-sized ice boulders, carved by tectonic patterns unique to Enceladus, and almost entirely free of impact craters. These features set the southerly region apart from the rest of the moon.
The new image products can be seen at http://ciclops.org, http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov and http://www.nasa.gov/cassini.
As white as fresh snow, Enceladus (505 kilometers, 314 miles across) has the most reflective surface in the solar system. Previous Cassini flybys have revealed that Enceladus, in contrast to the other icy moons of Saturn, possesses lightly cratered regions, fractured plains and wrinkled terrain.
The new findings add to the story of a body that has undergone multiple episodes of geologic activity spanning a considerable fraction of its lifetime, and whose southern-most latitudes have likely seen the most recent activity of all. These same latitudes may also bear the scars of a shift in the moon's rate of spin. This speculation which, if true, may