Mysterious Red Arcs Found on Saturn’s Icy Moon Tethys

The enhanced-colour images of Tethys show that the red arcs across the surface of the moon are narrow, curved lines, and are among the most unusual colour features to be revealed by Cassini’s cameras.

Other filters have given the scientists a much broader look at these objects, though, and they get even more unusual and wonderful with each image.

Cassini has been traveling the planet Saturn and its moons since 2004 and the latest images were taken in April. Indeed, it wasn’t until they combined images with disparate filters-some green, others clear, a few UV and then also IR spectral filters-that the graffiti-like traces were caught.

The origin of the features and their reddish color is a mystery to scientists with the Cassini mission.

Prominently seen in Tethys’ surface are deep red arc-shaped streaks. The color of the surface can be seen to change across the disk, from yellowish hues to almost white.

The worldwide Cassini spacecraft has gotten some awesome footage of Tethys – one of the mysterious ice moons of Saturn. As a result, the red arc features have become clearly visible for the first time.

The new discovery remains a mystery for scientists, who can not explain what led to their formation. “It’s surprising how extensive these features are”.

According to Paul Helfenstein, a scientist at Cornell University working on the Cassini imaging team, the red arcs should definitely be geologically young for the reason that they cut across some older features such as impact craters; however, their age in years is not known. The spacecraft was able to do as northern hemisphere of Saturn is moving into its summer along with enhanced lighting. There are possibilities that the arcs could be exposed ice with chemical impurities, or the result of the release of a gas from inside Tethys, the scientists said, adding that the streaks could also be fractures that are below the resolution of the available images. “If the stain is only a thin, colored veneer on the icy soil, exposure to the space environment at Tethys’ surface might erase them on relatively short time scales.” Red features are rare on Saturn’s 62 moons, NASA said, except for a few areas on crater-covered Dione.

While it is possible that these red bands are more common on Tethys than we realize, and they are simply covered over fairly quickly by ice deposited on the surface, closer, higher-resolution images scheduled for later this year may tell us more.