Lost in the vastness of space, the Earth appears as an insignificant pinprick of light between the mighty rings of Saturn in a new image from the Cassini spacecraft.
The Nasa probe, which has been investigating Saturn and its moons since 2004, captured the extraordinary photo on April 12 at a distance of 870 million miles from Earth.
A blown-up version of the image clearly shows the moon a short distance to the left of the planet.
Saturn’s rings are made up of countless icy particles and boulders up to a metre across in size. The two main rings visible above and below the Earth are the A ring (top) and the “F” ring (bottom) - Saturn’s outermost ring.
The American space agency released the photos as Cassini nears the dramatic grand finale of its mission.
On April 26, the spacecraft will start a series of 22 dives through the 1,500 mile-wide gap between Saturn and its rings.
On its final orbit on September 15, Cassini will make a suicidal plunge into Saturn’s atmosphere, beaming a stream of unique data back to Earth before burning up.