The great mystery of the Solar System has just been unlocked

The upper atmosphere of Saturn is very hot even though they are much farther from the Sun than Earth. For a long time, this heat source has become one of the great mysteries of the Solar System, causing scientists a headache.

However, thanks to the data obtained from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, astronomers have recently discovered this great mystery of the Solar System.

Specifically, the scientists discovered that the strong aurorae in the southern and northern poles of Saturn is the reason for the planet's atmosphere to warm up.

The solar wind and the charged particles emanating from the Moon, Saturn's rings interact with each other to cause electric current. That current stimulates atoms and molecules in the planet's air envelope to create sparks on the aurora and heat up the upper atmosphere. This explains why the top of Saturn's atmosphere is so hot while the rest is cold.

Tommi Koskinen, a member of the research team, said the new discovery is important for our general understanding of the atmosphere on the planets. At the same time, the new research results are also an important part of Cassini's legacy.

Similar to Saturn, other planets in the Solar System such as Jupiter and Uranus also record unusually hot phenomena in the atmosphere. However, the same conclusion cannot be deduced from these planets from the data collected on Saturn, said Zar Zarah Brown, co-author of the study.