White clouds cover Saturn's moon Titan, NASA Cassini image reveals mesmerising view

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which has already entered the last lap of the journey of its Grand Finale around Saturn, has been doing a wonderful job. As Cassini probe dives through the Saturn rings, it continues to send some mesmerising farewell images of the gas giant.

NASA Cassini probe has yet again captured new images from above the surface of one of Saturn's largest moon Titan revealing spectacular views.

As the Cassini probe passed above Titan’s surface, it clicked some breath-taking images on May 7, 2017 providing glimpse of bands of bright, feathery methane clouds drifting across the moon. The dark regions seen at the top of the picture are hydrocarbon lakes and seas of Titan.

Two versions of the image have been released – one which has stronger enhancement (figure A) and one with much softer enhancement (figure B). 

Cassini captured this view from a distance of 316,000 miles (508,000 kilometers) while making a distant (non-targeted) flyby when the probe passed 303,000 miles (488,000 kilometers) above the surface of Titan.

Cassini will go more close to the Titan when it will perform some targeted flybys of the Saturn’s moon but still it continuous to observe the celestial body and its atmosphere from a distance.

US space agency NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which is on its last journey of Saturn mission, has been doing a great job ever since it has entered the ‘Grand Finale’ and performing some really risky and death-defying dives between the gas giant and its rings. 

Cassini has performed two of the total 22 planned dives and has sent really useful data back to the Earth. During its second dive, NASA Cassini probe captured some stunning pictures of planet Saturn and beamed them back to Earth recently.

The pictures released recently revealed Saturn’s moon Rhea and Titan and provided great details of the rings of the planet. Cassini captured the pictures at various points and sent them back to NASA on May 3.

Sharp lines formed by dust and debris that surround Saturn were revealed in the images. Recent evidence showed that life may exist on

Saturn following which scientists have been investigating the gas giant. However, researchers had been dismissing about the chances of life on Saturn for years because of the fact that the sixth planet lack all building blocks necessary to sustain life.

But Cassini spacecraft has recently provided data which shows that the missing ingredient required for establishing that life may exist on Saturn. That missing ingredient is hydrogen. 

ALSO READ | NASA Cassini's latest pics of Saturn reveal great details of planet, show Rhea and Titan moons

The element has been discovered by scientists on one of the moons of Saturn. On May 4, scientists had said that hydrogen could act as “a potential source of chemical energy that could support microbes”.

On May 9, The Cassini probe will take its final tour, travelling from the northern tip of the planet to the south.

ALSO READ | NASA releases video showing how Cassini spacecraft captured stunning view of Saturn during its first dive

Our @CassiniSaturn spacecraft saw bands of bright, feathery methane clouds drifting on Saturn's moon Titan on May 7: https://t.co/ZLUUaEOmp6 pic.twitter.com/ut7rsRxo0t

— NASA (@NASA) May 10, 2017