Orbit
Tethys orbits Saturn at a distance of about 295000 km (about 4.4 Saturn's radii) from the center of the planet. The orbital eccentricity is negligible, while the orbital inclination is about 1 degree. The moon is locked in an inclination resonance with Mimas, which, however, does not cause any noticeable orbital eccentricity and tidal heating.
The Tethyan orbit lies deep inside the magnetosphere of Saturn, so the plasma co-rotating with the planet strikes the trailing hemipshere of the moon. Tethys is also subject to constant bombardment by the energetic particles (electrons and ions) present in the magnetosphere.
The co-orbital moons Telesto and Calypso are located within Tethys's Lagrangian points L4 and L5, 60 degrees ahead and behind Tethys in its orbit respectively.
Read more about this topic: Tethys (moon)
Famous quotes containing the word orbit:
“The human spirit is itself the most wonderful fairy tale that can possibly be. What a magnificent world lies enclosed within our bosoms! No solar orbit hems it in, the inexhaustible wealth of the total visible creation is outweighed by its riches!”
—E.T.A.W. (Ernst Theodor Amadeus Wilhelm)
““To my thinking” boomed the Professor, begging the question as usual, “the greatest triumph of the human mind was the calculation of Neptune from the observed vagaries of the orbit of Uranus.”
“And yours,” said the P.B.”
—Samuel Beckett (1906–1989)
“The Fitchburg Railroad touches the pond about a hundred rods south of where I dwell. I usually go to the village along its causeway, and am, as it were, related to society by this link. The men on the freight trains, who go over the whole length of the road, bow to me as to an old acquaintance, they pass me so often, and apparently they take me for an employee; and so I am. I too would fain be a track-repairer somewhere in the orbit of the earth.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)