The Hubble Space Telescope captured a cosmic dance performed by the Northern blue lights of Saturn's ring.
The European Space Agency released the new ultraviolet images that showed bright flashes of auroras lighting up the ringed planet's North Pole on May 19. These images also showed astronomers how the Sun's energy affect Saturn's magnetic field.
"Saturn was caught during a very dynamic light show," ESA officials told Space.com. "Some of the bursts of light seen shooting around Saturn's polar regions traveled more than three times faster than the speed of the gas giant's roughly 10-hour rotation period."
The pictures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope were captured in April and May 2013, and could aid scientists in discovering more about how Saturn's auroras change through time. Experts could also use the images to map out the light's movement in respect to time and space on Saturn.
NASA officials explained that Saturn's magnetic field, or magnetotail, is similar to a comet tail. Other planets that have this magnetic field include Uranus, Neptune, Mars and Earth.
"This magnetotail is present around planets that have a magnetic field, caused by a rotating core of magnetic elements. It appears that when bursts of particles from the sun hit Saturn, the planet's magnetotail collapses and later reconfigures itself, an event that is reflected in the dynamics of its aurorae [auroras]," NASA said in a statement to Space.com.
Here on Earth, auroras are produced when particles from the Sun come into contact with the atmosphere, resulting in green and red lights that are only visible in places with higher latitudes.
The pictures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope were part of a three-year observation study conducted by Hubble and Cassini. Together, the two spacecraft put together a 360-view of Saturn's North Pole and South Pole auroras.
