Slow dust in Enceladus' plume from condensation and wall collisions in tiger stripe fractures

Jürgen Schmidt (), Nikolai Brilliantov, Frank Spahn and Sascha Kempf
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Jürgen Schmidt: Nichtlineare Dynamik, Universität Potsdam, Am Neuen Palais 10, 14469 Potsdam, Germany
Nikolai Brilliantov: Nichtlineare Dynamik, Universität Potsdam, Am Neuen Palais 10, 14469 Potsdam, Germany
Frank Spahn: Nichtlineare Dynamik, Universität Potsdam, Am Neuen Palais 10, 14469 Potsdam, Germany
Sascha Kempf: Max Planck Institut für Kernphysik

Nature, 2008, vol. 451, issue 7179, 685-688

Abstract: Two-paced plume The Cassini mission discovered a spectacular plume of water vapour and icy dust particles spewing from ice volcanoes near the south pole of Saturn's moon Enceladus. The plume has a puzzling property that has yet to be explained: the grains are moving more slowly than the vapour. Schmidt et al. present a quantitative model for the condensation of icy grains in the geysers of Enceladus that offers a possible explanation. The speed difference arises whilst the gas and dust are below the surface, where repeated wall collisions of grains combine with re-acceleration by the gas to cause friction that in turn reduces grain velocity.

Date: 2008
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DOI: 10.1038/nature06491

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