Ringed Planets in our Solar System

Ringed Planets in our Solar System - Printable Version

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Ringed Planets in our Solar System - Yazata - Feb 11, 2023

We all know about Saturn and its glorious rings. But actually all four of the Gas Giants have rings, Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune in addition to Saturn.

And it turns out that they aren't the only ringed bodies out there. Rings have been discovered around three little "minor planets", with maybe a fourth as well.

One is an asteroidish thing called Chariklo, about 250 km across located between Saturn and Uranus.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10199_Chariklo

The other two appear to be Kuiper Belt objects out beyond Neptune. One is Haumea, an oval shaped thing about 1,000 km by 2,000 km. (Pluto is more uniformly spherical with a diameter of about 2,300 km) Haumea has been discovered to have a ring.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haumea

And just the last few days another one has been announced. This is Quaoar. It's about 1,100 km in diameter, about half Pluto. (Quaoar has a little moon called Weymot, about 170 km diameter.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50000_Quaoar

Quaoar's ring was discovered by occultation when it passes in front of a star, by watching for little dips in the star's brightness before and after Quaoar itself passes.

Something that has caused a bit of consternation among astronomers is that Quaoar's ring is a long ways from the little 'planet'. Rings are usually close to their planet, inside what is called the Roche limit where tidal forces tear moons apart or prevent them from forming. But Quaoar's distant ring is far outside it's small Roche limit.

The best hypothesis for why it's there is that it is the result of a cosmic collision, not a gravitationally torn up or failed moon. It's a thin band but seemingly pretty dense since it causes big dips in brightness when it passes in front of distant stars.

The jury is still out on whether another little asteroidish minor planet between Saturn and Uranus called 2060 Chiron has rings as well. It's starting to look more and more like it does. (It's ~100-130 km)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2060_Chiron

https://badastronomy.substack.com/p/a-ring-for-quaoar?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

RE: Ringed Planets in our Solar System - C C - Feb 16, 2023

Seems to border on being a minor attribute of the outer solar system, like what color blindness is to Pingelap. (I can't believe those people spend their whole lives living on less than a square mile of land.)

RE: Ringed Planets in our Solar System - Yazata - Feb 16, 2023

(Feb 16, 2023 02:06 AM)C C Wrote: Seems to border on being a minor attribute of the outer solar system

I love the Kuiper Belt and the outer Solar System. It seems that there are lots of planets out there in addition to the familiar nine which seemed pretty fixed for many years. (Today it's 8, after the rejection of poor Pluto. It just wants to be loved and accepted, and wears a great big heart on its side! Pluto is still every child's favorate, they identify with it.)

Sad

But Pluto gets to be the charter member of a cool new club, and the Solar System no longer has a small fixed number of planets. There are new planets (Ok, small ones, but they aren't "minor" to me) being discovered all the time. Its unknown how many there are or how far out they extend. 2000 km is 1,242 miles, so some of them are respectable little places.

I like that.

And maybe a big Planet 9 is hiding out there among them...

Quote:like what color blindness is to Pingelap. (I can't believe those people spend their whole lives living on less than a square mile of land.)

They even have their own language, spoken by about 250 people!

[Image: ?u=https%3A%2F%2Fcurioustimes.in%2Fwp-co...ipo=images]

RE: Ringed Planets in our Solar System - Zinjanthropos - Feb 16, 2023

For what it’s worth? What if…….

https://www.livescience.com/what-if-earth-had-rings.html