January 8, 2016
On your birthday, the Earth completed another orbit — 584 million miles traveled since your last celebration.
Prometheus and the F Ring
Birthday · January 8, 2016
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APOD published January 8, 2016. Full image credits are on the original APOD entry below. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
In Greek myth Prometheus was a Titan, known for bringing fire from Mount Olympus. But in modern times the name is given to a small moon of Saturn, orbiting just inside Saturn's F ring. In a complex interaction, the tiny potato-shaped moon interacts with the icy ring particles creating structures along the F ring still not fully understood. One of the highest resolution views of Prometheus, this image of its pocked surface posing with the thin F ring in the background was taken during the Cassini spacecraft's close approach on December 6, 2015. Elongated Prometheus is roughly 150 kilometers (90 miles) long by 70 kilometers wide.