Cassini RPWS:  Bizarre Features of Saturn's Radio Emissions
Channel: Space Audio
Date: 2014-03-25

Saturn is a source of intense radio emissions. The radio waves are closely related to the auroras near the poles of the planet. These auroras are similar to Earth's northern and southern lights. The Cassini spacecraft began detecting these radio emissions in April 2002 when Cassini was 2.5 astronomical units from the planet using the Cassini Radio and Plasma Wave Science (RPWS) instrument. The RPWS has now provided the first high resolution observations of these emissions that show an amazing array of variations in frequency and time. In this example, it appears as though the three rising tones are launched from the more slowly varying narrowband emission near the bottom of this display. If this is the case, it represents a very complicated interaction between waves in Saturn's radio source region, but one which has also been observed at Earth!

Time on this recording has been compressed such that 13 seconds corresponds to 27 seconds, or, about 2x real time. Since the frequencies of these emissions are well above the audio frequency range, we have shifted them downward by a factor of 260.

For more information about Cassini RPWS, see
http://www-pw.physics.uiowa.edu/cassini

For more space audio, see
http://youtube.com/VoyagerPWS