Image of the Earth from Saturn (the glow in his ring) caught ... - The Mundo.es

July 19 gala clothe yourselves, gather family and friends, go up to the roof and say hello to space. They will be photographed. Cassini NASA and ESA orbiting Saturn to study its surface, its moons and rings, made photography a that day from the confines of the solar system in which you can observe a shy, pale blue dot .

will Earth from Saturn . Our planet will be ‘only’ 1,600 million km from the second planet in our solar system, equivalent to no more than one pixel in a picture size . However, from the Cassini confident they can take a picture of very good quality, which improves the famous ‘Pale Blue Dot’ that captured the Voyager-1 in 1990.

“It will be an interplanetary cosmic photo ,” said Carolyn Porco, Cassini project manager. “People will be aware that there in the distance, over a thousand miles away, a robot will be doing a photo. It’s really cool ,” he adds.

Cassini has gotten more times capture images of the Earth from Saturn, but this time, both the distance and the planning behind it to make it different. Porco’s team takes time studying the perfect time and the right filters for taking a picture of the Earth that captures its characteristic blue color.

An event to celebrate

But to take a photo of the inner solar system from its farthest borders need to Saturn comes between the Sun and Cassini. That eclipse will prevent the probe detectors suffer from radiation damage and its instruments.

“The image of the Earth between the rings of Saturn captured in September 2006 has become one of the most beautiful images Cassini” says Porco, who insists that this new opportunity to improve their quality. In his Twitter account does not hide that emotion, and there’s even a website that is preparing to celebrate the event.

Opportunities like this can not be allowed to escape, especially bearing in mind that Cassini is scheduled to end in 2017 , 20 years after its launch on October 15, 1997. Several options have been considered to end it, from an impact with Saturn led to a ‘parking’ of the ship in an orbit in which there is no risk of impact with another moon. Finally it was decided to send high eccentricity orbit (ie, with very high degree of deviation) which held 20 laps to deviate and impact the surface of Saturn .