Composite Hubble Space Telescope (HST) image of the Saturn Lyman-alpha bulge (white latitudinal band), an emission of radiation from atmospheric hydrogen. The data from a near-ultraviolet image obtained in 2017 during the Saturn summer is used in the image to show the Lyman-alpha emission of the planet. This increased level of radiation indicates that a portion of the atmosphere is being heated from an outside source. It's believed that particles from Saturn?™s icy rings (dark blue) raining into the planet's atmosphere can cause atmospheric heating, making the upper atmosphere hydrogen reflect more Lyman-alpha sunlight in the bulge region. This disintegration of the rings could be due to a range of phenomena including micrometeorites, bombardment by solar wind or solar ultraviolet radiation. This unexpected interaction between the rings and the upper atmosphere is being investigated to define new diagnostic tools for estimating if distant planets have extended Saturn-like ring systems. Data from the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph instrument.