Description
Accurate positional measurements of planets and satellites are used to improve our knowledge of both their orbits and their dynamics and to infer the accuracy of the planet and satellite ephemerides. In the framework of the European FP7 ESPaCE program, we provide the positions of Saturn and its major satellites taken with the U.S. Naval Observatory 26-inch refractor from 1974 to 1998. 526 astrophotographic plates were measured with the digitizer of the Royal Observatory of Belgium and reduced through an optimal process that includes image, instrumental, and spherical corrections using the UCAC4 catalog to provide the most accurate equatorial (RA, DEC) positions.
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