Hyperion pops into view in this image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft.
The moon looks a bit like a sponge and has unusual dimensions, 328 by 260
by 214 kilometers (204 by 162 by 132 miles).
Craters are visible on the moon's surface down to the limit of resolution
in this image, which is about 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) per pixel. Like a
sponge, Hyperion's density seems to indicate that it is porous and much
of its interior is filled with voids.
Dark material is concentrated in the bottoms of visible craters. This may
have been caused by the downslope movement of material, combined with ice
changing from solid to gaseous state.
The image was taken with the narrow angle camera during a distant
encounter with Hyperion on June 10, 2005. It was acquired from a distance
of about 176,000 kilometers (109,000 miles) using a spectral filter
sensitive to ultraviolet wavelengths centered at 338 nanometers.
A separate, stereo (or 3D) version of the scene is also available
(see PIA06244). A movie sequence from this encounter is also available (see
PIA06243). The image has been contrast-enhanced to aid visibility.
The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European
Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. 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 and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and
assembled at JPL. The imaging team is based at the Space Science
Institute, Boulder, Colo.
For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov.
For additional images visit the Cassini imaging team homepage http://ciclops.org.
