Mountain Views News          Saturday, September 12, 2015

15

THE WORLD AROUND US

 Mountain Views News Saturday, September 12, 2015 


CERES’ SPOTS AND SATURN’S RINGS

The bright spots on dwarf planet Ceres gleam 
with mystery in new views delivered by NASA’s 
Dawn spacecraft from an altitude of 950 miles. 
These closest-yet views of Occator crater, with 
a resolution of 450 feet per pixel, give a deeper 
perspective on these very unusual features.

 Animations are available at:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.
php?id=pia19890 

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.
php?id=pia19891 

 “Dawn has transformed what was so recently 
a few bright dots into a complex and beautiful, 
gleaming landscape,” said Marc Rayman, Dawn’s 
chief engineer and mission director based at JPL.

 Dawn is the first mission to visit a dwarf planet, 
and the first to orbit two distinct solar system 
targets. It orbited protoplanet Vesta for 14 months 
in 2011 and 2012, and arrived at Ceres on March 
6, 2015.

*******

 ONE OF SATURN’S RINGS IS NOT LIKE 
THE OTHERS. When the sun set on Saturn’s 
rings in August 2009, scientists on NASA’s 
Cassini mission were watching closely. It was the 
equinox—one of two times in the Saturnian year 
when the sun illuminates the planet’s enormous 
ring system edge-on. 

 Like Earth, Saturn is tilted on its axis. Over the 
course of its 29-year-long orbit, the sun’s rays move 
from north to south over the planet and its rings, 
and back again. The changing sunlight causes 
the temperature of the rings—which are made 
of trillions of icy particles—to vary from season 
to season. During equinox, which lasted only a 
few days, unusual shadows and wavy structures 
appeared and, as they sat in twilight for this brief 
period, the rings began to cool.

 In a recent study published in the journal 
Icarus, a team of Cassini scientists reported 
that one section of the rings appears to have 
remained warmer than expected during equinox. 
This provided a unique window into the interior 
structure of ring particles not usually available to 
scientists.

 “For the most part, we can’t learn much about 
what Saturn’s ring particles are like deeper than 1 
millimeter below the surface. But the fact that one 
part of the rings didn’t cool as expected allowed 
us to model what they might be like on the inside,” 
said Ryuji Morishima of JPL, who led the study.

 The researchers examined data collected by 
Cassini’s Composite Infrared Spectrometer 
during the year around equinox. The instrument 
essentially took the rings’ temperature as 
they cooled. The scientists then compared the 
temperature data with computer models that 
attempt to describe the properties of ring particles 
on an individual scale.

 What they found was puzzling. For most of 
the giant expanse of Saturn’s rings, the models 
correctly predicted how the rings cooled as they 
fell into darkness. But one large section—the 
outermost of the large, main rings, called the 
A ring—was much warmer than the models 
predicted.

 To address this curiosity, Morishima and 
colleagues performed a detailed investigation of 
how ring particles with different structures would 
warm up and cool down during Saturn’s seasons. 
The team’s analysis suggested the best explanation 
for the A ring’s equinox temperatures was for the 
ring to be composed largely of particles roughly 3 
feet wide made of mostly solid ice.

 “A high concentration of dense, solid ice chunks 
in this one region of Saturn’s rings is unexpected,” 
said Morishima. “Ring particles usually spread 
out and become evenly distributed on a timescale 
of about 100 million years.”

 You can contact Bob Eklund at: b.eklund@
MtnViewsNews.com.


OUT TO PASTOR 

A Weekly Religion Column by Rev. James Snyder


IF EVERYTHING IS COMING UP ROSES, WHAT ABOUT 
ALL THE THORNS?

When it comes to flowers, a 
flower is simply a flower. I do not 
know the difference between a 
rose and a lily. If it looks pretty, I like it. I like to keep 
things simple.

When I have to buy flowers for the Gracious Mistress 
of the Parsonage, I have a wee bit of difficulty. 
Thankfully, the florist where I purchase flowers 
seems to know quite a bit about flowers. All I need to 
do is say, "I'd like to order flowers for my wife."

Usually they will begin the conversation by saying, 
"What kind of flowers would you like?"

To which I will respond, "Flowers for my wife."

I explain to them my flower deficiency and the 
flowers are not for me, so I do not care, they are for 
my wife. They nod their head, smile knowingly, and 
make a selection for me.

By the time we had been married for eight years, she 
commented on the flowers, which I did not quite get 
at the time. She simply said, "These flowers are as 
lovely as the same ones you bought last year for me."

At the time, I smiled and thought I had hit it out of 
the ballpark.

As a young husband, I did not quite know how 
to interpret many of the comments coming from 
my wife. I soon began to understand wives speak 
a different language than husbands. To this day, 
I am not quite sure what she is saying to me, but I 
smile broadly, nod my head vigorously and hope I'm 
somewhere in the ballpark.

Then came the time she wanted to plant roses in 
our backyard. I was all for it. When she brought the 
subject up, I smiled broadly and nodded my head 
vigorously not really knowing what was before us. 
Actually, not knowing what was before me.

First, we went to a garden store, of which I have never 
been to before, to select the roses for our backyard. 
I am always excited about any new experiences, 
especially if it involves both my wife and me. It is nice 
to do things together.

As we entered the store, my wife knew exactly where 
to go and led the way to the flower center. It was such 
a new experience to me I walked behind her with my 
mouth open staring to my left and then to my right. I 
never knew so many different flowers existed.

My wife, on the other hand, seemed to know exactly 
where she was going. 

Then, we finally arrived at our destination. The Rose 
Center. 

I must confess I was rather confused. It was the Rose 
Center but there were no roses to be found. All I 
could see were a bunch of pots with sticks sticking 
out of them with thorns. I was to become personally 
acquainted with those thorns later.

"Where," I asked, "are the roses?"

"Right in front of you!" I ignored her sarcastic tone 
and looked at what she thought were roses. Under the 
circumstances, I decided to let it go. I figure there is 
no sense to embarrass her in front of the public. If she 
sees roses, who am I to contradict her?

Then I had a panic moment. One of the customer 
service personnel was walking in our direction. My 
"husband-mode" kicked in and I wanted to rescue my 
wife from an embarrassing moment.

I stepped up, shook the customer service personnel's 
hand and said, "I think we're a little lost here. We're 
looking for roses."

"Well," he said with a big smile, "you're in the right 
place. These are the best roses you will find anywhere."

To which, I was discombobulated. I looked all around 
and could not see one rose. I really do not like to be 
snookered like this. When I want to buy a rose, I 
want to buy a rose.

At this point, my good wife took over and began 
a very technical conversation about the roses she 
wanted for our backyard. I tried to keep up, but I was 
so confused and I am not sure I understood exactly 
what they were talking about.

Before I could figure it all out, we were loading all 
of these pots with sticks onto a shopping cart and 
headed for the checkout counter. Looking at me my 
wife said, "You do have your credit card, don't you?"

Still in a maze, I pulled out my credit card and in 
short time we were headed for my truck to load all of 
these pots in the back.

When we got home, we began the arduous task 
of transferring the sticks from the pots into our 
backyard. The only thing I could see were the thorns 
and they seem to like my hands. I know where the red 
comes from, it's my blood.

Several weeks later, my wife came running into the 
house very excited and said, "Come and see the roses."

Much to my surprise on these sticks were these little 
rosebuds between all the thorns. I wondered where 
all those roses came from.

James, in his epistle, sets the stage for this. "My 
brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers 
temptations; Knowing this, that the trying of your 
faith worketh patience" (James 1:2-3).

Just like a rose bush, life has its share of thorns. 
Between those thorns are roses, which make the 
thorns worthwhile.

Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com