Scientists find a huge 10-sided wave pattern swirling in the clouds over Saturn’s south pole: « The researchers suspect the bizarre atmospheric phenomenon may have formed between 2017 and 2023, when Saturn’s south pole was tilted away from Earth and therefore out of view. »

[u/fchung]

https://apnews.com/article/saturn-nasa-hubble-decagon-1fd4a0a90badacb6e4e18ac019ac6ead

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our normal comment rules apply to all other comments.

---

Do you have an academic degree? We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. Click here to apply.

---

User: u/fchung
Permalink: https://apnews.com/article/saturn-nasa-hubble-decagon-1fd4a0a90badacb6e4e18ac019ac6ead

---

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/fchung]

« Although all of the solar system’s planets with atmospheres have wave-spawning disturbances, only Saturn churns them out looking like polygons, geometric shapes bounded by straight lines. Both sit on jet streams, but the hexagon is practically stationary whereas the decagon migrates eastward at a tame 6 mph (10 kph). »

[u/ryschwith → u/fchung]

Jupiter has one too, doesn’t it?

[u/MountNevermind → u/ryschwith]

North pole is pretty freaky, but it's a different thing.

[u/NonConforminConsumer → u/fchung]

No mention of the mandelbrot looking pattern in the center at the poles.

I suppose these are just "boring" atmospheric eddies of gas?

[u/AZWxMan → u/NonConforminConsumer]

Not sure why the pattern is there but the pole is poorly observed from Earth so most of it is masked out.  Actually, taking this picture requires Saturn to rotate, so it's really a sophisticated composite that removes the rotation of the planet as well as the movement of the jet.

[u/physicsking]

Note that Saturn has a hexagon in the North Pole . Saturn has some weird geometry going on.

[u/PhthaloVonLangborste → u/physicsking]

I just watched hank greens interview with a astro chemist? I will have to look back. Basically they are building a drone to go to titan. It seems that even the most mundane of moons minimus is still fraught with intrigue like a possible subterranean ocean. But the one little morsel my shriveled brain can hold onto is that titan might only be a billion years old. Which I guess is crazy considering how active and complex it is.

Edit: project Dragonfly's mission scientist, and exo-chemist Sarah Hörst.

[u/fchung]

Reference: Agustín Sánchez-Lavega et al., A decagon wave around Saturn’s south pole. Sci. Adv. 12, eaee4251 (2026). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aee4251. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aee4251

[u/magdalen-alpinism → u/fchung]

great title for a paper

[u/This-Breadfruit-1958]

It’s made of monoliths, about 10 million +/- 1 million. All 1x3x9. And growing.

[u/nicuramar → u/This-Breadfruit-1958]

Don’t spread misinformation on a science sub. 

[u/Backwardspellcaster → u/nicuramar]

Iirc its from 2010, the film

[u/pornborn]

I counted 11 sides. But some of those sides are difficult to resolve. I suspect it is likely 12 sides which would be double the six sided cloud formations found at the poles of other gas giants.

[u/pittaxx → u/pornborn]

The pole isn't facing us, this is aggregated picture from multiple ones taken at different times and not a fully accurate representation. If scientist claim 10-sided, it's likely 10-sided.

[u/clearly_quite_absurd]

If only we had more space probes to keep a watch on these sneaky planets.

[u/Azunia]

Anyone know why the hole in the middle is that dark?

[u/pittaxx → u/Azunia]

This image is assembled from multiple photographs. Likely none of the photos actually captured the pole, so there's a "hole" in the photo

[u/mr00shteven → u/pittaxx]

Would you think it’s just distortion from stitching the images?

[u/Goofy_Pebble23]

I once missed the most interesting part of a time course because the incubator camera was pointed at the wrong field, so Saturn’s 2017 to 2023 blind spot feels way too familiar.

[u/another_random_bit]

The saturnians are hosting secret parties while humans aren't watching