CICLOPS: Cassini Imaging Central Laboratory for OPerationS
East of Wisps

East of Wisps
PIA 14586
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   Cassini examines the anti-Saturn side of Dione and shows the cratered surface east of the moon's distinctive wispy terrain.

The wispy terrain, which consists of bright cliffs on the moon's trailing hemisphere, can just barely be seen on the limb of the moon on the left of the image. North on Dione (698 miles, 1123 kilometers across) is up. See PIA12608 for a better view of the wisps. See PIA07769 for more southern view of Dione presented in dramatic false colors.

This view looks toward the northern, sunlit side of the rings from just above the ringplane.

The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Oct. 2, 2011. The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 174,000 miles (280,000 kilometers) from Dione and at a Sun-Dione-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 11 degrees. Image scale is 2 miles (3 kilometers) per pixel.

The Cassini Solstice Mission is a joint United States and European endeavor. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter was designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team consists of scientists from the US, England, France, and Germany. The imaging operations center and team lead (Dr. C. Porco) are based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.

For more information about the Cassini Solstice Mission visit http://ciclops.org, http://www.nasa.gov/cassini and http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
Released: December 12, 2011 (PIA 14586)
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