Sentences with phrase «orbit around the moon during»

Not exact matches

During a busy first year in orbit around Saturn, the Cassini spacecraft got its first close - up look at the ringed planet's sixth - largest moon, Enceladus — and wowed scientists in the process.

Because the icy moon is not perfectly spherical — and because it goes slightly faster and slower during different portions of its orbit around Saturn — the giant planet subtly rocks Enceladus back and forth as it rotates.

Cassini took nearly a half - million images during its mission, which included more than 13 years in orbit around Saturn, a tour that repeatedly took the probe by the moons Titan and Enceladus, two places scientists are eager to send another spacecraft in the search for microbial life.

On December 1, 2009, two astronomers submitted a pre-print suggesting that the planet's extreme axial tilt (an obliquity of 97 degrees) may have resulted from the presence of a large moon that has since been ejected from orbit around the ice giant by the pull of another planet during the orbital migration of the giant planets early in the formation of the Solar System.