Italian astronomer, Jean  Dominique Cassini, who discovered the prominent gap in Saturns main  rings, as well as the icy moons, Iapetus, Dione, Rhea, and Tethys.  The space mission in Gattaca is destined for Saturn. In 1997, NASA  launched the Cassini space probe bound for Saturn. It carried the  Huygens space probe, which was dropped into Titan in early 2005, and  discovered ground under the clouds.