Pandora (moon)
Pandora is a moon of Saturn. The moon was found in 1980 from Voyager 1’s photo and named after Pandora in Greek mythology. It is the outer shepherd satellite of Saturn's F ring, the inner satellite being Prometheus. Pandora has many craters in its surface.
 View of Pandora's western hemisphere.[lower-alpha 1] | |
| Discovery | |
|---|---|
| Discovered by | Stewart A. Collins D. Carlson Voyager 1 |
| Discovery date | October, 1980 |
| Designations | |
| MPC designation | Saturn XVII |
| Pronunciation | /pænˈdɔːrə/ |
Named after | Πανδώρα Pandōra |
| Adjectives | Pandoran[1] |
| Orbital characteristics [2] | |
| Epoch December 31, 2003 (JD 2453005.5) | |
| 141720±10 km | |
| Eccentricity | 0.0042 |
| 0.628504213 d | |
| Inclination | 0.050°±0.004° to Saturn's equator |
| Satellite of | Saturn |
| Physical characteristics | |
| Dimensions | 103.0 × 79.0 × 63.0 km (± 0.6 × 0.6 × 0.4 km)[3]: 2 |
Mean diameter | 80.0±0.6 km[3]: 2 |
| Volume | 268990±860 km3[4]: 4 |
| Mass | (1.357±0.002)×1017 kg[lower-alpha 2] |
Mean density | 0.5045±0.0017 g/cm3[4]: 4 |
| 0.0022–0.0061 m/s2[3]: 3 | |
| 0.019 km/s at longest axis to 0.024 km/s at poles | |
| synchronous | |
| zero | |
| Albedo | 0.6 |
| Temperature | ≈ 78 K |
List of photos
Photo taken by Cassini–Huygens (September 2005).
Pandora photo from the Cassini probe in 2005; the rings of Saturn are in the background._PIA_12690.png.webp)
Cassini photo of Pandora (June 3, 2010).
Voyager 2 photo of Pandora (August 1981).
Notes
- This view was taken by Cassini, during the spacecraft's close flyby on December 18, 2016. The image was taken from a distance of 40,500 kilometres (25,200 miles); the closest approach by the spacecraft during its 14-year tenure in the Saturn system.
- Calculated from the standard gravitational parameter GM = (9.058±0.011)×10−3 km3·s–2 given by Lainey et al. (2023), divided by the gravitational constant G = 6.6743×10−2 km3·kg–1·s–2.[4]
Sources
{{Commons category|Pandora (moon)
- Robert Kolvoord (1990) Saturn's F ring: imaging and simulation, p. 104
- Spitale Jacobson et al. 2006.
- Thomas & Helfenstein 2020.
- Lainey et al. 2023.
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