Saturn’s Rings Will Exist just for a Blip over time

No worries though. Jupiter, Neptune or Uranus could create their own beautiful, bright ring display in the distant future.

  • Ring Rain
  • Ring Revelations

Humanity exists at a very special time in our solar system’s history — the era of Saturn’s rings. In the next 100 million years, Saturn’s rings will completely disappear, and, as revealed by a new Science study, planetary scientists have realized that it acquired its rings only very recently. During the Cassini mission’s final months at Saturn, the NASA spacecraft carried out a series of daring orbits through the space between the planet’s cloud tops and innermost edge of its rings. The so-called “Grand Finale” signaled that the end was nigh for the probe and, on Sept. 15, 2017, it burned up in the gas giant’s atmosphere, bringing a spectacular 13 years of science in Saturn’s orbit to a poignant close. The spacecraft was low on fuel and, to avoid an accidental crash into one of Saturn’s potentially habitable moons, such as Enceladus or Titan, NASA had long ago decided that the best way to dispose of the mission was to burn it up in Saturn’s upper atmosphere. The agency wanted to avoid Earthly contamination on these pristine alien environments.


Video advice: 1 февраля ГОД ТИГРА! Подарки от ВАСИЛИСЫ ВОЛОДИНОЙ + КАК УЗНАТЬ ЛИЧНЫЙ ПРОГНОЗ (запись трансляции)

Личные прогнозы на 2022 год


Bye Bye Cassini, the Tenacious Space Probe That Revealed Saturn’s Secrets

For two decades, the sophisticated probe has brought us insights into space weather and water on distant worlds.

More amazingly, now that we know that underneath the crust of Enceladus is really a global sea of liquid saltwater and organic molecules, all being heated by hydrothermal vents around the seafloor. Detailed research into the plumes show they contain hydrocarbons. All of this suggests the chance that Enceladus is definitely an sea world harboring existence, the following within our solar system.

A planet of dynamic change

In 2010, during northern springtime, an unusually early and intense storm appeared in Saturn’s cloud tops. It was a storm of such immensity that it encircled the entire planet and lasted for almost a year. It was not until the storm ate its own tail that it eventually sputtered and faded. Studying storms such as this and comparing them to similar events on other planets (think Jupiter’s Great Red Spot) help scientists better understand weather patterns throughout the solar system, even here on Earth.

The (Not So) Sad Story of Peggy, Saturn’s Newest Moon

(Updated December 14, 2022) Peggy, the small Saturn moon caught in the act of being born, is still alive. First observed in 2022, Peggy is about 1.2 miles wide and lives near the edge of Saturn’s A ring. The tiny moonlet’s fate was an open question two years ago, when observations in 2022 did not (…)

(Original story, posted January 2022) – ScienceNo Place Like Home(Updated December 14, 2016)Peggy, the little Saturn moon caught in the process to be born, continues to be alive. First noticed in 2013, Peggy is all about 1. 2 miles wide and lives close to the fringe of Saturn’s A diamond ring. The small moonlet’s fate was a wide open question 2 yrs ago, when observations in 2014 didn’t reveal exactly the same big, vibrant blip within the rings that initially tricked Peggy’s presence. At that time, planetary researcher Carl Murray surmised that Peggy had either been gravitationally booted in to the void, or had damaged apart inside a collision. However in Cassini observations from 2015 and 2016, Peggy has returned. It will appear as if the moonlet isn’t entirely intact, like a new slice of something has become orbiting Saturn nearby. Murray suspects that Peggy did, actually, collide by having an unknown object at the begining of 2015: The encounter pressed the small moon much deeper in to the disk from the A diamond ring, produced another chunk (adorably known as Peggy B), and created bad weather of icy particles that orbits together with Peggy.


Video advice: Saturn Is Going To Be Ringless…(RIP Saturn’s Rings)

I can’t believe it. Saturn’s rings are reported to be gone.


Astroquizzical

Originally posted at Forbes! Exoplanets (planets orbiting a star other than our own) have been much more present in the public eye since the launch and tremendous success of the Kepler planet-hunting satellite, which was really very recent; Kepler was launched in 2009, and had a few solid years of observations of a single patch of the Milky Way. But that’s not to say that scientists weren’t looking for them before then; the first tentative discoveries that were later confirmed to be real exoplanets happened in the late 1980s. These early discoveries were slow, painstaking measurements, and had to focus on individual stars for long stretches of time, to be sure that a planet was the best explanation for whatever signal you saw in the light. What hashappened recently is that we’ve found a way to be much more efficient in our searching, so the number of known planets outside our solar system has skyrocketed. To find an exoplanet, there a couple of different methods you can try, and in either case, the actual measurement that you need to take is reasonably straightforward in principle.

Search CICLOPS for space images and movies, space art, and more

Search for images, movies, graphics and space art from Cassini and other Outer Solar System missions.

Enceladus at Close Range – Jul 29, 2005 Throughout the very close flyby of Enceladus two days ago, multiple Cassini instruments, working concurrently, made the outstanding discovery that water and heat vapor are getting away in the interior across the prominent “tiger stripe” fractures close to the moon’s south pole.

Enceladus! – Mar 9, 2006 A masterpiece of deep time and wrenching gravity, the tortured surface of Enceladus and its ongoing geologic activity tell the story of the ancient and present struggles of one small world . . . a world which, today, appears to have bodies of liquid water rich in simple organics beneath its south pole. This surprising story is recounted by imaging scientists in a paper to be published in the journal Science on March 10, 2006.


Video advice: Why Saturn’s Rings Do Not Become Moons: The Roche Limit

How tidal forces prevent rings from forming into moons.


[FAQ]

How long will Saturns rings last?

300 million yearsBased on the observed rate, Saturn's rings will completely disappear within 300 million years, at most. Saturn and its spectacular rings, as imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope on July 4, 2020.

Are Saturns rings disappearing?

In December 2018, scientists from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) estimated that Saturn's rings also disappearing at an accelerated rate. In fact, they are raining down particles that could fill an olympic-sized pool every 30 minutes.

Do Saturn's rings change over time?

Why does the appearance of Saturn's rings change over time as seen from Earth? The rings lie in the planet's equatorial plane, which is tilted with respect to the ecliptic. ... The surface temperature of Saturn, though cold, is much higher than would be expected from the amount of solar energy it receives.

Can Saturn live without its rings?

It Could Happen, and Sooner Than Astronomers Expected. The “ring rain” that falls into the gas giant is so abundant that the icy bands could disappear in 300 million years, or even sooner.

Are Saturn's rings important?

Those moons contribute dust to the rings as well as absorb dust from the rings. ... After the impact the remnants of the asteroids and the debris from the moons could not escape the gravitational pull of the planet. One other theory holds that the rings of Saturn formed as other moons broke apart in ancient times.

Erwin van den Burg

Stress and anxiety researcher at CHUV2014–present
Ph.D. from Radboud University NijmegenGraduated 2002
Lives in Lausanne, Switzerland2013–present

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