Saturn is known for its legendary ability to produce a dazzling array of colors. Beautiful ringsHowever, astronomers find these rings a bit of a puzzle. Initial thought was that they formed around the same period as the planet 4 billion years back. The Cassini spacecraft data suggests the rings may be much more. You are younger than thisThe rings formed less than 100million years ago. Now, a new study suggests that the rings could have been formed from a long-lost moon, explaining several of Saturn’s peculiarities.
Saturn rotates at 27 degrees tilt, slightly off the plane in which it orbits sun. Saturn rings are also tilted. Recent research suggests that these factors could be explained by Chrysalis, a former moon that was close to Saturn and torn down. While the majority of the moon was absorbed into the planet, the rest created the amazing rings.
This can explain the planet’s tilt too. Long-held belief was that Saturn was tilted because of the gravitational force of Neptune. But the new model suggests this is not the case. Saturn is now in resonance with Neptune. This could have been caused by the movements of the since-destroyed lunar moon.
“The tilt is too large to be a result of known formation processes in a protoplanetary disk or from later, large collisions,” lead researcher Jack Wisdom of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology In a statement. “A variety of explanations have been offered, but none is totally convincing. The cool thing is that the previously unexplained young age of the rings is naturally explained in our scenario.”
The existence of the Chrysalis moon, thought to be about the size of Iapetus, Saturn’s third-largest moon, can therefore explain both why the rings are so young and why the planet tilts the way it does.
“Just like a butterfly’s chrysalis, this satellite was long dormant and suddenly became active, and the rings emerged,” Wisdom.
The journal publishes the research. Science.
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