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Wandering across the heavens, the bright planets Jupiter and Saturn were named by the Romans after their most powerful gods. Not until the 1700s and 1800s were two more planets uncovered, telescopically, far beyond Saturn. They were named after the Greek god Uranus and the Roman god Neptune.
Early skywatchers could never have imagined that robotic emissaries would be sent along a perilous route from Earth to travel across millions and billions of miles to actually visit these wonder worlds. The close-up pictures from NASA's pair of Voyager spacecraft mesmerized an entire generation in the 1980s. But these spacecraft visits were mere snapshots collecting precious data spanning just a few months — like a tour bus barreling across the United Sates.
"The Voyagers don't tell you the full story," said Dr. Amy Simon, an astronomer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "Hubble's image sharpness is comparable to the Voyager views as they approached the outer.
.. News Staff.
