Astronomers have unveiled a series of images, showing the north pole of Saturn in ultraviolet light.

The pictures, using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space telescope, provide astronomers with the most comprehensive picture so far of Saturn's northern aurora.

In 2017, over a period of seven months, the observations were taken before and after the Saturnian northern summer solstice.

The European Space Agency (ESA) says: "These conditions provided the best achievable viewing of the northern auroral region for Hubble.

"On Earth, auroras are mainly created by particles originally emitted by the Sun in the form of solar wind.

"When this stream of electrically charged particles gets close to our planet, it interacts with the magnetic field, which acts as a gigantic shield.

"While it protects Earth’s environment from solar wind particles, it can also trap a small fraction of them.

The image, observed with the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph in the ultraviolet, shows the auroras surrounding Saturn's north pole region | Image: ESA/Hubble, NASA & L. Lamy (Observatoire de Paris)

"Particles trapped within the magnetosphere - the region of space surrounding Earth in which charged particles are affected by its magnetic field - can be energised and then follow the magnetic field lines down to the magnetic poles.

"There, they interact with oxygen and nitrogen atoms in the upper layers of the atmosphere, creating the flickering, colourful lights visible in the polar regions here on Earth".

However, these auroras are not unique to Earth.

Other planets in the solar system have been found to have similar auroras - such as Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.

Because the atmosphere of each of the four outer planets is dominated by hydrogen, Saturn’s auroras can only be seen in ultraviolet wavelengths.

The ESA adds: "The images show a rich variety of emissions with highly variable localised features.

"The variability of the auroras is influenced by both the solar wind and the rapid rotation of Saturn, which lasts only about 11 hours.

"On top of this, the northern aurora displays two distinct peaks in brightness - at dawn and just before midnight.

"The latter peak, unreported before, seems specific to the interaction of the solar wind with the magnetosphere at Saturn's solstice."