Saturn’s moon Rhea has oxygen atmosphere
NOV 29, 2010
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.024859
Daily Mail : For the first time, an oxygen atmosphere has been discovered on a world other than Earth—on Saturn’s second-largest moon, Rhea. In March NASA’s Cassini spacecraft flew though the moon’s outer atmosphere, scooping up and identifying molecules in situ. Published in Science , the findings reveal an extremely thin atmosphere with an oxygen density about 5 trillion times less than that of Earth. The paper’s authors speculate that the atmosphere is sustained by high-energy particles bombarding the moon’s icy surface and kicking up atoms, molecules, and ions.
© 2010 American Institute of Physics
