What is unique about Mimas?

What is unique about Mimas?

Mimas’ most distinctive feature is the giant impact crater Herschel, named in honor of William Herschel (the discoverer of Uranus, its moons Oberon, and Titania, and the Cronian moons Enceladus and Mimas). This large crater gives Mimas the appearance of the “Death Star” from Star Wars.

Why is Mimas called the Death Star?

Mimas, Saturn’s cryptic-looking moon, is awfully deceptive. The small moon is dominated by an 80-mile-wide crater, giving it the appearance of the grim Star Wars Death Star — a space station equipped with a planet-destroying weapon.

What is the moon Mimas named after?

It was named after one of the Greek Titans who was the son of Gaia and was slain by Hercules. Mimas was discovered by the British astronomer, Sir William Herschel in 1789. Most of what we now know about Mimas was discovered during the two Voyager missions.

How old is the moon Mimas?

Mimas’s Herschel Crater formed 4.1 billion years ago. Mimas in real life is not actually round when viewed from space.

What was found on Mimas?

Did Mimas inspire the Death Star?

“The appearance of Mimas was not seen in detail until the Voyager spacecraft flew through the Saturn system in 1980, so the design of the Death Star was not influenced by Mimas,” a spokesperson at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory told Space.com.

Who ran the first Death Star?

As a loyal protégé of Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, Tarkin became one of the most ardent supporters of the newly declared Empire. Palpatine put Tarkin in charge of construction of the Death Star, a secret project that would take nearly two decades to complete.

Who discovered Mimas?

Mimas was discovered on Sept. 17, 1789 by English astronomer William Herschel, using his 40-foot reflector telescope. Ground-based astronomers could only see Mimas as little more than a dot until Voyagers I and II imaged it in 1980.

How long is a day on Mimas?

One day on Mimas is equal to 23 hours.

What color is Mimas?

The natural color of Mimas visible to the human eye may be a uniform gray or yellow color. The image shows NASA’s Cassini spacecraft imaging science subsystem visible-light mosaic of Mimas from previous flybys on the left.

How cold is Mimas?

The surface is icy and heavily cratered. Mimas has a low density, meaning it probably consists mostly of ice. Because Mimas has such a low temperature of about -200° C (-328°F), the impact features may date back to the time of the moon’s creation.

Is there life on Mimas?

Scientists say Mimas’ ocean might support life, even if it is encased in ice. “Because the surface of Mimas is heavily cratered, we thought it was just a frozen block of ice,” Dr. Alyssa Rhoden, a specialist in the geophysics of icy satellites, said in a statement.

How big is Mimas?

Does Mimas have water?

Saturn’s moon Mimas may be the newest, if not the most unlikely member of the solar system’s family of icy bodies with internal liquid water oceans, according to a new study by Alyssa Rose Rhoden of the Southwest Research Institute and Matthew E.

Is Mimas bigger than the moon?

Discovered in 1789 by Herschel. Mimas’ low density (1.17) indicates that it is composed mostly of water ice with only a small amount of rock. The surface of Mimas is dominated by an impact crater 130 km across, known as Herschel; it’s almost 1/3 of the diameter of the entire moon.

How long is a year on Mimas?

How far is Mimas from Earth?

What makes Mimas a distinct moon?

What makes Mimas a distinct moon? It suffered a huge meteorite impact that must have nearly shattered it.

What is unusual about Saturn’s moon Mimas?

Less than 123 miles (198 kilometers) in mean radius, crater-covered Mimas is the smallest and innermost of Saturn’s major moons. It is not quite big enough to hold a round shape, so it is somewhat ovoid with dimensions of 129 x 122 x 119 miles (207 x 197 x 191 kilometers, respectively).

What is the moon Mimas made of?

Mimas’ low density (1.17) indicates that it is composed mostly of water ice with only a small amount of rock. The surface of Mimas is dominated by an impact crater 130 km across, known as Herschel; it’s almost 1/3 of the diameter of the entire moon.

Why does Mimas have a huge crater?

The huge crater, named Herschel after the 1789 discoverer of Mimas, Sir William Herschel, spans about 130 kilometers and is featured here. Mimas’ low mass produces a surface gravity just strong enough to create a spherical body but weak enough to allow such relatively large surface features.

Why does the face of Mimas face Saturn?

Like a lot of moons in the solar system, including our own, Mimas always shows essentially the same face to its parent planet. This is called a spin-orbit resonance, meaning the moon’s rotation, or spin, is in sync with its orbit around Saturn.