
Saturn's North Pole Is A Hexagon, And No One Knows Why - PhearTheCeal
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130220.html
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lkrubner
Reseachers were able to model this in the lab:

[http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-04/saturns-
myster...](http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-04/saturns-mysterious-
hexagon-recreated-lab)

~~~
MikeCapone
Original source: [http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2010/04/saturns-
strang...](http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2010/04/saturns-strange-
hexagon-recreate.html)

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gavanwoolery
I can posit a theory:

A hexagon is a boundary shape with the least energy. What you are really
probably seeing is a circle that has pushed outwards against another set of
forces and reached equilibrium (differing temperatures, gasses, who knows
what). I have been playing with voronoi diagrams and diffusion limited
aggregation recently , and it is amazing some of the structures that will
emerge when a system reaches equilibrium. It is possible that certain forces
have aligned with their peak energies in the form of a regular polyhedra,
which happens all over nature on large and small scales.

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tome
I find it hard to imagine what dynamics could give rise to a regular shape
that's not a circle. Could you elaborate?

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VLM
Its "common knowledge" that standard twist drills sometimes cut stable
polygons instead of perfect circles if its a wimpy metal for the drill and a
tough metal for the work (which is why woodworkers don't see this often).
Thats why machinists rough cut a hole with a standard twist drill about 1/32
small then ream to precise diameter. Take something wiggly-ish thats X units
long and it'll tend to catch in a corner, then sweep out a radius of X units
until it slips free (and typically gets stuck in the next corner).
Unfortunately this is stable and self reinforcing. Hexagons and higher order
polygons are pretty rare usually you get somewhat oversize triangle-ish shaped
hole. Yes the sides are not precisely flat they are curved.

So the above is a factual statement of reality. A wild conjecture is this
metalworking effect might be a physical manifestation of what the OP is
talking theoretically about. A further (pair of?) wild conjecture is either my
example or the OPs example could have something to do with saturn's hexagon. I
would not be completely surprised if there is a numerological oscillation set
up where 1/6th (or 1/3rd) of a planetary rotation is exactly long enough for
prevailing winds or a sonic boom or something like that to cross the diameter
of the hexagon. Or we're seeing a weird phase change trick as "something"
evaporates and condenses in response to a rolling atmospheric high pressure
zone.

There's also a circle packing argument where at a deeper atmospheric layer
than we can see, there's six rotating vortexes which just fit within the hex.

All I can say is I'm thankful its a stable 6-agon instead of a stable 5-agon
or we'd never hear the end of it from the nutcases.

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ChuckMcM
There are a number of fluid dynamic studies that show 'angled' flow, generally
around mixed densities and viscositys coming into contact with each other.
That said, its a cool effect.

If it were science fiction there would be a giant hexagonal shaped structure
under the clouds on the pole. Waiting ...

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bdunbar
It's God's own hex nut.

Don't take it off! Saturn will fall off and go wobbling around the Solar
System.

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hoodoof
There - intelligent design, the evidence.

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guard-of-terra
This kind of design doesn't strike me as very intelligent.

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bdunbar
You just lack a God-like perspective, is all.

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jere
>It turned out that the rate of ring rotation changed the shape of the pattern
from a circle to just about anything, including ovals, triangles, squares and
various polygons.

Wow. Imagine if it were a square on Saturn. I think that would provide more
fodder for sci fi writers than the hexagon.

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aperiodic
You can build hexagons really easily out of equilateral triangles, which seems
even purere than squares to me.

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michaelsbradley
Perhaps it's related to the plasma phenomenon of dicotron instability?

[http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/whycassini/cassini...](http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/whycassini/cassini20110420.html)

<http://www.plasma-universe.com/Diocotron_instability>

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diocotron_instability>

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teeja
<http://www.bioedonline.org/news/news.cfm?art=2531> _Researchers at the
Technical University of Denmark in Lyngby have created similar geometric
shapes (holes in the form of stars, squares, pentagons and hexagons) in
whirlpools of water in a cylindrical bucket._

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espadrine
The website has an awkwardly placed link.

The link mentions "Saturn's South Pole … with its rotating vortex" with a link
to another post from the website with a picture of the vortex, but the
description is that of "the north pole of Saturn… [a] vortex of strange and
complex swirling clouds" encompassed in a hexagon.

Do we have pictures of the south pole?

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Cushman
Found one by clicking "rotating vortex" > "infrared images" > "rotating
vortex": <http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap061113.html> . I guess someone got lazy.

~~~
brownbat
The video attached to the link, "huge vortex rotating" on that Saturn page
is... not exactly what I expected.

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jkd
we know it already [http://mysteriesexplored.wordpress.com/2012/01/05/saturn-
and...](http://mysteriesexplored.wordpress.com/2012/01/05/saturn-and-lord-
shaneeshwara-part-two-end/)

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amai
I bet on <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_wave> : The waves can take the
form of stripes, close-packed hexagons, or even squares or quasiperiodic
patterns. See also [http://nanopatentsandinnovations.blogspot.de/2012/11/new-
typ...](http://nanopatentsandinnovations.blogspot.de/2012/11/new-type-of-
gravity-wave-has-shape-of.html)

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jimmahoney
Reminds me of the 1986 novel Saturnalia -
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturnalia_(Callin_novel)> \- in which the
aliens who leave calling cards in the moons of Saturn are called "hexies"
because they use so many 6's in their messages.

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vanderZwan
What about Rayleigh–Bénard convection?

" _Convective Bénard cells tend to approximate regular right hexagonal prisms,
particularly in the absence of turbulence_ "

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayleigh-B%C3%A9nard_convection>

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return0
Clearly it must be that Saturn is a truncated icosahedron or similar. it was
probably laser-cut by the aliens in the galactic planet factory.

