Introduction
Saturn,
the sixth planet in our solar system and the second largest, has a diameter of
120,536 km, a mass of and spins every 10 and 1/4 hour. It is the least dense of
the planets; its specific gravity (0.7) is less than that of water.
Like Jupiter, Saturn is about 75% hydrogen and 25% helium with traces of water,
methane, ammonia and "rock", similar to the composition of the
primordial Solar Nebula, from which the
solar system was formed.
Rings
Two
prominent rings (A and B) and one faint ring (C) can be seen from the Earth.
There are also four additional faint rings.Moons
Saturn
has the most moons - 18 named ones and at least 4 unnamed ones. Only one moon is
large: Titan. It is the second largest moon in the solar
system. Titan is about half water ice and half rocky material, and is surrounded
by a thick, opaque atmosphere; the surface cannot be seen at all in visible
light. There are 6 medium-size moons and 11 small moons.
Special Features
Saturn has bright spots that are probably similar to, but much larger than,
terrestrial thunderstorms. It is not clear what the dark spots are, though they
seem to resemble similar Jovian dark
spots.
The largest violet-coloured cloud belt is Saturn's North Equatorial Belt, whose
true colour is brownish. The colour difference between the belts and zones may
be attributed to a thicker haze layer.
The south hemisphere appears bluer than the north hemisphere because of
differences in scattering of sunlight.