Sign up for free

Newsletters

Once a month
get new photos
and expert tips.

Science and Space
Main Health and Human Body Earth Space Prehistoric World A-Z

Aurora on Saturn

Streams of charged particles blasted from the sun collide with Saturn's magnetic field, creating an aurora on the planet's south pole. Unlike Earth's relatively short-lived auroras, Saturn's can last for days. Scientists combined ultraviolet images of the auroras, taken by Hubble over a period of days, with visible-light images of the ringed planet. In this view the aurora appears blue because of the ultraviolet camera, but a Saturn-based observer would see red light flashes.

Photograph courtesy NASA, ESA, J. Clarke (Boston University), and Z. Levay (STScI)