NASA discovers Pac-Man on Saturn moon
A heat map of Mimas reveals "a sharply defined Pac-Man shape"
NASA's Cassini Spacecraft recentlycaptured a temperature map of Mimas, one of Saturn's moons, as part of the globally-supportedCassini-Huygens mission. Massively interesting as that is, we wouldn't be writing about the accomplishment if the image reflected the expected "smoothly varying temperatures." It doesn't. Instead, NASA's astronomy geeks got a chance to reference both Pac-Man and Star Wars in one post, an opportunity we imagine they relished. But it really does look like Pac-Man:
Above: Pac-Moon!
Of course, the amusing reference isn't actually the discovery - according to NASA's post, "scientists were completely baffled by the Pac-Man shape." It's a for reals scientific mystery, and Pac-Man just happens to be the best descriptor for the anomaly. Either that, or we should all hope that Mimas has enough power pellets to save us when the space ghosts come.
Above: Wakka wakka
Mar 29, 2010
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