What is Iapetus moon made of?
Iapetus is probably the most unusual of Saturn’s moons. It has a low density similar to that of Rhea. This indicates that it contains very little rocky material and is composed mainly of water ice.
Does Iapetus have a moon?
It quickly solidified, while major impacts created its five largest craters and kicked up debris. Some of that debris may have formed a ring or a moon that was tidally broken up into a debris disk, which then fell down onto the surface of Iapetus, forming the equatorial ridge, while the bulge became frozen in.
What is special about Iapetus moon?
With its distant, inclined orbit, Iapetus is the only large moon from which there is a nice view of the rings of Saturn. As with some other Saturnian moons, Iapetus is in resonance with Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, which orbits at 759,200 miles (1,221,850 kilometers).
How big is Iapetus compared to the Earth?
Size, Mass and Orbit: With a mean radius of 734.5 ± 2.8 km and a mass of about 1.806 × 1021 kg, Iapetus is 0.1155 times the size of Earth and 0.00030 times as massive. It orbits its parent planet at an average distance (semi major axis) of 3,560,820 km.
How was Iapetus made?
The ridge wrapped around Iapetus’ equator may have formed early in its history, when the moon spun faster than it does today. It may also have been created from material deposited by a ring or moon that collapsed onto the satellite.
What was Iapetus the Titan of?
IAPETUS (Iapetos) – Greek Titan God of Mortality.
What is the surface of Iapetus?
The surface of Iapetus is heavily cratered, with large impact basins up to 580 kilometres across. Surface darkening on Iapetus comes from organic materials left behind as ice in the warmer Cassini Region region sublimates.
What is Iapetus the Titan of?
What mystery is associated with Iapetus?
The origin of Iapetus’s Janus faces is one of the longest standing mysteries in the solar system, one that has persisted since the moon’s discovery by the astronomer Giovanni Cassini in 1671. But the mystery may at last have been solved.
Why is Iapetus black and white?
Using pictures taken by Cassini, particularly during a September 2007 close fly-by, the scientists assert that Iapetus’ darker half, called Cassini Regio, is the result of the planet’s leading side getting bombarded by dusty debris from another Saturnian moon, Phoebe, which orbits in the opposite direction beyond …
What is the gravity on Iapetus?
0.223 m/s²Iapetus / Gravity
Is Iapetus a god?
COMMENTARY. Iapetos (Iapetus) may have been the Titan god who presided over the mortal life-span who assigned mortal creatures their finite lot. Like his brother Titanes, he was a god of time, one of the sons of Ouranos, the great dome of heaven which measured all of time.
Why is Iapetus green?
The color image on the right shows the results of mapping for three components of Iapetus’ surface: carbon dioxide that is trapped or adsorbed in the surface (red), water in the form of ice (green), and a newly-discovered effect due to trace amount of dark particles in the ice creating what scientists call Rayleigh …
Who was Iapetus in Greek mythology?
Mythology. Iapetus (“the Piercer”) is the one Titan mentioned by Homer in the Iliad as being in Tartarus with Cronus. He is a brother of Cronus, who ruled the world during the Golden Age, but is now locked up in Tartarus along with Iapetus, where neither breeze nor light of the sun reaches them.