Planet With Supersized Rings MORE These ‘Vintage’ NASA Posters Imagine Travel Beyond the Stars “It took us a year even to convince ourselves of what we were seeing,” says Mamajek, whose paper is based on a new analysis of observations taken back in 2007 by the SuperWASP planet search project. At the time, the observations seemed to make no sense: when a planet passes in front of a star, you usually see a dip in starlight that lasts for up to a few hours. In this case, the starlight dimmed for two months. It wasn’t a steady dip, either. The star would fade, then brighten, then fade again, in a way that made no sense at all. When Mamajek and his group stumbled on the data in 2010, he says, “I took a printout of the light curve, put it on the wall, and stared at it for a week.” Crazy as it seemed, the most plausible explanation was a giant ring system with gaps like Saturn’s that let more or less light through at different times during the passage. “It’s the same indirect way the rings of Uranus were discovered in 1977,” he says.

The planet itself doesn’t show up in the observations, but that could be explained if the ring system is slightly off-center as it moves in front of the star. You can see how this works in an animation put together by Mamajek’s collaborator Matthew Kenworthy, of the University of Leiden, in the Netherlands. The star which the new planet orbits is thought to be very young—about 16 million years, compared with our own Solar System’s 4.6 billion. If the scientists are right about what they’re seeing, the mammoth ring system will get smaller over time as the outer bands condense into moons. “That’s what you see in [our] Solar System,” says Kenworthy. “You have rings tucked in close to the planets and moons further out. So presumably we’re seeing the intermediate step.” It all seems familiar, except for the ring system’s size, which is unprecedented—and which is the reason other astronomers are waiting to be convinced. “I agree with the authors that it’s appropriate to consider an interpretation based on rings,” says Eric Ford, an expert on exoplanets at Penn State.

The idea that the outer parts would condense into moons relatively quickly, however, means that we’re seeing the rings at their full extent during a very narrow window of existence—the sort of coincidence that scientists don’t love to see. “Whenever your explanation involves catching something during a phase that won’t last very long,” Ford says, “it’s a little concerning.” MORE Cousins of Earth Found Deep in Space Much of the doubt could be erased if astronomers could see the rings pass by again on another orbit around the star. Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened: they’ve got only the single passage back in 2007, meaning the exoplanet is on a relatively long orbit. “We think it’s at least ten or 15 years,” says Kenworthy. They don’t know for sure, though, and since it’s tough to keep big telescopes aimed at this one star hoping for another passage, the astronomers have recruited members of the high-end amateur group, the American Association of Variable Star Observers , to monitor the situation. They’re also going back through digitized versions of old images from observatories around the world, looking for evidence of other stars that faded mysteriously for a while without explanation.

“Now that we know what we’re looking for,” Mamajek says, “we might find that there are lots of them out there.” They might, that is, if they’re really seeing rings. “I keep telling people, ‘if you can think of a better explanation, please let me know,'” Mamajek says, and he means it. So far, he has no takers. “The signal is very strong,” says Harvard’s David Kipping, who is doing his own search for exomoons, “and its difficult to believe the instrument could misbehave on such a huge scale. I think many of us find the signal interesting,” he says. That, by itself, is enough to keep the astronomy community looking. This date in science: Uranus discovered, completely by accident | Space | EarthSky This date in science: Uranus discovered, completely by accident By EarthSky in Space | March 13, 2015 William Herschel noticed while surveying stars that one object moved apart from the star background. It was the first planet discovered since ancient times. March 13, 1781. The 7th planet – Uranus – was discovered on this date, completely by accident.

British astronomer William Herschel was performing a survey of all the stars that were of magnitude 8 – in other words, too faint to see with the eye – or brighter. That’s when he noticed an object that moved in front of the star background over time, clearly demonstrating it was closer to us than the distant stars. At first he thought he had found a comet, but later realized this object was a new planet in orbit around our sun – the first discovered since ancient times. Later, it turned out, astronomers learned they had observed Uranus as far back as 1690. But it was Herschel who first realized the true nature of this distant light in our sky. William Herschel’s famous 40-foot telescope, constructed between 1785 and 1789 at Observatory House in Slough, England. It was the largest telescope in the world for 50 years. Image via Wikimedia Commons. Herschel proposed to name the object Georgium Sidus, after King George III, but those outside of Britain weren’t pleased with the idea. Instead, on the suggestion of astronomer Johann Elert Bode, astronomers decided to follow the convention of naming planets for the ancient gods.

Uranus – an ancient sky god, and one of the earliest gods in Greek mythology – was sometimes called Father Sky and was considered to be the son and husband of Gaia, or Mother Earth. King George III was still pleased, however. As a result of Herschel’s discovery, the king knighted him and appointed him to the position of court astronomer. The pension attached let Herschel quit his day job as a musician and focus his full attention on observing the heavens. He went on to discover several moons around other gas giant planets. He also compiled a catalog of 2,500 celestial objects that’s still in use today. Voyager 2 gave us our first close-up image of the planet Uranus in 1986. Its images showed a featureless gas giant world. Voyager 2 image showing Uranus in true and false color. Image via NASA In 1977, astronomers using the Kuiper Airborne Observatory made another serendipitous discovery – of rings around the planet Uranus. That discovery made Uranus the second known ringed planet in our solar system.

The closest we humans have come to Uranus was in 1986, when the Voyager 2 spacecraft swung by the planet. At its closest, the spacecraft came within 81,500 kilometers (50,600 miles) of Uranus’s cloudtops on Jan. 24, 1986. Voyager 2 radioed thousands of images and voluminous amounts of other scientific data on the planet, its moons, rings, atmosphere, interior and the magnetic environment surrounding Uranus. Today, Uranus is known to possess a complicated ring system (although nowhere near as complicated as that encircling Saturn). This schematic of the Uranian rings is from Wikimedia Commons. Bottom line: British astronomer William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus – first planet to be discovered since ancient times – on March 13, 1781.

Top 5 Weird Facts About Mysterious Uranus: Photos Top 5 Weird Facts About Mysterious Uranus: Photos By Elizabeth Howell, Discovery News | March 15, 2016 03:07pm ET MORE Weird Facts Credit: NASA When William Herschel first spotted Uranus with a telescope on March 13, 1781 the discovery opened up the solar system. There were planets beyond what the ancients knew! There was a planet that takes a human lifetime (84 years) to go once around the sun! But for 200 years, Uranus was just a point of light in a telescope's eyepiece and we could see few details. PHOTOS: Voyager 2's Epic Outer Solar System Odyssey To celebrate the 235th anniversary of Uranus' discovery, here are some of the most mind-blowing things discovered about the blue planet. It's only been visited once, by Voyager 2 in 1986, but we also study it from afar with powerful modern telescopes, such as the Hubble Space Telescope. Imagine what discoveries we'll come up with the next time we send a probe that far out in the solar system.

Uranus has a weird rotation and tilt Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech Something big might have crashed into Uranus in the past, because the planet is rotating on its side. Its magnetic north and south are also way different than its polar north and south. All told, this causes some bizarre seasonal effects. Imagine a world where, for example, the south pole is pointed at the sun while the north pole is shrouded in darkness. That was the situation Voyager 2 encountered when visiting in 1986. Image: Clouds at the south pole of Uranus seen in false color (right) compared to what you can see with your eyes. Picture by Voyager 2. Uranus had storms happen at an unexpected time Credit: Imke de Pater (UC Berkeley) and W.M. Keck Observatory When Uranus got to its closest approach to the sun in 2007, astronomers expected that there would be more storms marring its normally calm surface. To astronomers' delight, the stormy activity actually extended at least as long as 2014.

"Why we see these incredible storms now is beyond anybody's guess," said co-investigator Heidi Hammel of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, in a statement. At the time, astronomers said that more studies of outer planet atmospheres would be needed to better understand what was happening. Image: Rare storms on Uranus captured by the Keck II telescope on Aug. 6, 2014. Uranus has rings Credit: NASA/JPL/STSCI Uranus' rings were actually found by sharp-eyed astronomers in 1977, who watched the planet pass in front of a star (SAO 158687). They noticed the light of the star flickering on and off, indicating that something (the rings) was blocking the light as the planet passed through. There are now more than a dozen known rings found around the planet, from a combination of ground observations, Voyager 2's flyby and the Hubble Space Telescope. The circumstances behind their formation are poorly understood, however. Image: The major rings of Uranus are shown along with a false-color image of the planet. This was taken with the Hubble Space Telescope in 1998.

Uranus isn't the farthest planet, but it's the coldest Credit: NASA/JPL As many schoolchildren know, Uranus is an outer solar system planet. Neptune is the next known planet lying beyond its reach, and there may possibly be another large planet even further away ( nicknamed "Planet Nine" by the astronomers who proposed its existence ). Surprisingly for planetary scientists, it turns out that Neptune is not the coldest planet known in our solar system; it's Uranus. That's because Uranus has no internal heat source to supplement the heat of the sun. Image: Artist's impression of the solar system (not to scale). Uranus is the second-furthest planet from the sun. One of Uranus' moons looks like an abstract painting Credit: NASA/JPL NASA once used the Shakespearean-like phrase "tempestuous" to describe the geological history of Miranda. Only makes sense given all features in the Uranus system are named after Shakespearean characters. American planetary astronomer Gerard Kuiper found the moon in 1948, but Voyager's flyby in 1986 revealed some geological stuff we are still struggling to explain.

In 2008, NASA wrote that the moon was likely fractured up to five times during its history. The result is a mishmash of fresh regolith and older, cratered surfaces. The Solar System - Uranus. Our Solar System .... Uranus. Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun and is the third largest in the solar system. It was discovered by William Herschel in 1781. It has an equatorial diameter of 51,800 kilometres and orbits the Sun once every 84.01 Earth years. It has a mean distance from the Sun of 2.87 billion kilometres. The length of a day on Uranus is 17 hours 14 minutes. Uranus has at least 22 moons. The two largest moons, Titania and Oberon, were discovered by William Herschel in 1787. The atmosphere of Uranus is composed of 83% hydrogen, 15% helium, 2% methane and small amounts of acetylene and other hydrocarbons. Methane in the upper atmosphere absorbs red light, giving Uranus its blue-green colour.

The atmosphere is arranged into clouds running at constant latitudes, similar to the orientation of the more vivid latitudinal bands seen on Jupiter and Saturn. Winds at mid-latitudes on Uranus blow in the direction of the planet's rotation. These winds blow at velocities of 40 to 160 meters per second. Radio science experiments found winds of about 100 meters per second blowing in the opposite direction at the equator. Uranus is distinguished by the fact that it is tipped on its side. Its unusual position is thought to be the result of a collision with a planet-sized body early in the solar system's history. Voyager 2 found that one of the most striking influences of this sideways position is its effect on the tail of the magnetic field, which is itself tilted 60 degrees from the planet's axis of rotation. The magnetotail was shown to be twisted by the planet's rotation into a long corkscrew shape behind the planet. The magnetic field source is unknown; the electrically conductive, super-pressurized ocean of water and ammonia once thought to lie between the core and the atmosphere now appears to be nonexistent.

The magnetic fields of Earth and other planets are believed to arise from electrical currents produced in their molten cores. In 1977, the first nine rings of Uranus were discovered. During the Voyager encounters, these rings were photographed and measured, as were two other new rings and ringlets. Uranus' rings are distinctly different from those at Jupiter and Saturn. The outermost epsilon ring is composed mostly of ice boulders several feet across. A very tenuous distribution of fine dust also seems to be spread throughout the ring system. There may be a large number of narrow rings, or possibly incomplete rings or ring arcs, as small as 50 meters in width. The individual ring particles were found to be of low reflectivity. At least one ring, the epsilon, was found to be grey in colour. The moons Cordelia and Ophelia act as shepherd satellites for the epsilon ring. My e-mail address is lookup(at)ournightsky.com This site is © Copyright OurNightSky 2003-2007, All Rights Reserved.

The Solar System: Uranus | The Institute for Creation Research The Solar System: Uranus Resources › Physical Sciences Resources › Astronomy For millennia, the science of astronomy was limited to observations that could be made with the unaided eye. That changed in the 1600s with the invention of the telescope. As telescopes grew in size and optical quality, these marvelous instruments enabled astronomers to detect and investigate astronomical phenomena that are difficult or impossible to see with the unaided eye. Not least among these was the discovery of a previously unknown planet—Uranus. Discovery Sir William Herschel discovered Uranus on March 13, 1781. Herschel was a skilled astronomer, having constructed and used many different telescopes. With assistance from his sister Caroline, he systematically cataloged thousands of deep sky objects—i.e., celestial objects lying beyond the solar system. His survey formed the initial basis for what would become the New General Catalogue (NGC) of celestial deep sky objects that is still used by astronomers today. Herschel also specialized in observations of binary stars. It was during his systematic cataloging of binary stars that Herschel observed a small, light-blue disk.

It could not have been a star since stars, which appear as shimmering points in a telescope, are too distant to appear as disks. But this unusual object did appear as a small sphere with definite size. Hershel initially supposed it to be a comet. But as he tracked the object over several nights, he found that it did not move like a comet. Comets generally have highly elliptical orbits, but the extrapolated orbit of this blue disk was nearly circular. It had to be a planet. Herschel decided to name this new planet Geordium Sidus (Georges’s Star) to honor King George III. The choice was popular in England. Unsurprisingly, the international astronomical community rejected this name. Some favored naming the planet after Herschel, but tradition ultimately prevailed. The other five known planets (excluding Earth) were all named after Roman gods.1 That trend would continue, somewhat modified, with the new planet being named after the Greek god of the sky—Uranus (YOOR-un-us).2 Since Uranus is skyblue in color, the choice seemed fitting.3 Although Herschel is considered the discoverer of Uranus, he was not the first person to see it.

In the year 1690, John Flamsteed observed Uranus and cataloged it as the star 34 Tauri. Pierre Lemonnier also observed Uranus multiple times in the 1750s and 1760s, but neither he nor Flamsteed recognized the object as a planet. This is understandable. Uranus is a tiny blue disk and moves very slowly compared to the other planets. The planet is easily visible in binoculars but appears indistinguishable from a star at such low magnification. Patient observers with keen vision and dark skies may be able to see Uranus with the unaided eye—but just barely. For this reason, it is likely that many ancient astronomers also saw Uranus but failed to notice its slow movement relative to thousands of brighter stars. Properties Uranus orbits the sun at an average distance of 1.79 billion miles—over 19 times farther out than Earth. At such a distance, Uranus takes 84 years to orbit the sun. The planet is four times the diameter of Earth. Its outer composition is similar to that of Jupiter and Saturn—mostly hydrogen and helium gas, with a small percentage of methane.

Based on its density, the interior of Uranus is thought to be composed of various ices such as water, ammonia, and methane. For this reason, Uranus is sometimes referred to as an ice giant rather than a gas giant like Jupiter or Saturn. Detailed study of Uranus with Earth-based telescopes has been difficult due to the extreme distance. The Voyager 2 spacecraft provided the most detailed images to date when it flew past Uranus in 1986, generating pictures of a nearly featureless blue sphere without the prominent belts and zones found on Jupiter and Saturn.4,5,6 Though it appeared bland during the Voyager 2 flyby, Uranus does manifest white clouds on occasion that are detectable in large, Earth-based telescopes. Uranus has a system of rings that are quite different from the rings of Saturn. Saturn’s main rings are broad sheets of orbiting material, whereas the rings of Uranus are more like a series of 13 thin ropes. Each of these ropes encircles Uranus at a discrete distance, and all are in the plane of its equator. These rings were discovered in 1977 when Uranus passed in front of a bright star.

Astronomers were monitoring the brightness of the star in order to assess the atmosphere of Uranus in the brief moment when the planet just began to cover the star.7 Much to their surprise, the star “winked out” five times before Uranus passed in front of it and again five times afterward. They correctly deduced that a system of five narrow rings surrounds Uranus. The other eight rings were detected at a later date. Since their initial discovery, Uranus’ rings have been imaged directly by the Voyager 2 spacecraft and also by the Hubble Space Telescope. Unlike any other planet, Uranus rotates on its side. That is, the rotation axis is tilted approximately 90 degrees relative to the planet’s orbital plane.8 Consequently, Earth-based telescopes are able to look almost directly down the polar axis of Uranus every 42 years during the planet’s summer or winter solstice. Since the rings orbit around Uranus’ equator, they too are sideways, as are most of its moons. The extreme tilt of Uranus is contrary to the expectations of the secular model of solar system formation. Under this model, the planets ought to have formed such that their rotation axis is nearly perpendicular to their orbital plane.

Only Jupiter and Mercury meet this expectation. Secular scientists usually attribute the disagreement between observations and their theory to being the result of some giant impacts in the distant past that knocked the planets from their original vertical orientations. Moons Uranus has 27 known moons. Two of these, Oberon and Titania, were discovered by William Herschel in 1787 and are the largest and brightest moons of the Uranus system. Yet, they are less than half the diameter of Earth’s moon. The moons Ariel and Umbriel were discovered in 1851, and little Miranda was discovered in 1948. These constitute the five major moons of Uranus, all of which can be seen in a medium-size backyard telescope under very dark skies, though Miranda is particularly challenging. The remaining 22 moons are much smaller, all being less than about 50 miles in radius and generally non-spherical.9 They were discovered during or after the Voyager 2 flyby in 1986.

The naming of these moons began a new tradition—they are all named after Shakespearian characters (mostly from The Tempest) or characters from Alexander Pope’s poetry.10 John Herschel, the son of William, began this new custom to honor his English heritage. The Uranian moons are all composed of various combinations of rock and ice. Thirteen orbit close to the planet in nearly perfect circles. Next out are the five major moons. In order of increasing distance from the planet, they are Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania, and Oberon. They also orbit in nearly perfect circles and all in the planet’s equatorial plane. All 18 inner moons orbit prograde—in the same direction that Uranus rotates. Beyond Oberon, there is a considerable gap before we encounter the remaining nine moons. The orbits of these outer moons are not in Uranus’ orbital plane, and each has its own unique orbital plane. Eight of the nine have retrograde orbits—opposite the direction that Uranus rotates. This pattern of regular, prograde, coplanar moons being close to the planet and irregular, non-coplanar moons being at a greater distance seems to be a common feature of planets in the solar system.

Magnetic Riddles The orientation of Uranus’ magnetic field is quite unusual. Most planets have a magnetic field that is approximately aligned with their rotation axis. Not so with Uranus. The magnetic axis is offset from the rotation axis by an astonishing 60 degrees. Moreover, the magnetic axis does not pass through the center of the planet but is offset to one side by roughly one third the radius of the planet. From a secular perspective, it is mystifying that Uranus should have a magnetic field at all. Magnetic fields naturally decay with time and should be nonexistent in planets that are billions of years old. On the other hand, the magnetic field of Uranus fits perfectly with biblical creation. In 1984, creation physicist Russ Humphreys predicted the magnetic field of Uranus based on the amount of magnetic decay that would have happened on the planet in the 6,000 years since its creation.11 Voyager 2 confirmed this prediction. Although the presence of a strong magnetic field on any planet is a confirmation of recent creation, this is especially the case for Uranus.

Here’s why this challenges the secular view: To salvage their belief in billions of years from the contrary evidence of planetary magnetic fields, secular astronomers usually invoke a magnetic dynamo. A dynamo is a device that turns mechanical energy into the electrical current necessary for a magnetic field. Secular scientists have proposed that mechanical motion due to heat in a planet’s interior somehow forms a dynamo, thereby regenerating the planet’s magnetic field over millions and even billions of years. But of the four giant planets in our solar system, Uranus alone lacks any measureable internal heat. So, there is no power source for the dynamo. Also, dynamo models predict that the magnetic field axis must be fairly well aligned with the rotation axis. Uranus violates this condition as well. Conclusion The first planet to be discovered in modern times, Uranus is a diverse world of unique splendor. Its sky-blue disk is an enjoyable sight in a backyard telescope, and to spot its moons is a fun challenge. The properties of Uranus are fascinating and confound the secularists but clearly declare God’s glory.12 References The other five planets known at the time were Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. Neither Neptune nor the dwarf planet Pluto had yet been discovered.

The name was suggested by Johann Bode. Bode is known for his observation that the sequence of planet distances (in AU) from the sun can be approximated by a simple mathematical formula: a = 0.4 + 0.3×2n. This pattern is sometimes called Bode’s Law. The distance of Uranus matches the prediction of Bode’s Law. However, Neptune does not. Also, in Greek mythology Uranus was the father of Kronos—the Greek name for Saturn—just as in Roman mythology Saturn was the father of Jupiter. Voyager 2 is the only spacecraft to have visited Uranus. The color is caused by methane, which absorbs red light. Though imperceptible in visible wavelengths, belts and zones do appear in infrared images of Uranus. The astronomers who first detected Uranus’ rings were James Elliot, Edward Dunham, and Douglas Mink. The axial tilt of Uranus is usually reported either as 97.77° or 82.23°. The difference is due to ambiguity in which pole should be considered the North Pole.

If the North Pole is considered to be the pole under which the planet rotates counterclockwise, then Uranus is tilted 97.77° and rotates prograde—in the same direction as Earth. If the North Pole is considered to be that which lies above the orbital plane, then Uranus is tilted 82.23° and rotates retrograde, i.e., “backward” from Earth. For six of the planets, there is no difference between the two conventions. Venus and Uranus are the exceptions. The term radius is used somewhat loosely here since the moons are not generally spherical. The 22 small moons have a longest axis that is less than 100 miles in length, with the possible exception of Puck, which measures right at 100 miles. Three of the Uranian moons are named after characters from Alexander Pope’s humorous poem The Rape of the Lock in which a lock of a woman’s hair is snipped off and stolen. Humphreys, D. R. 1984. The Creation of Planetary Magnetic Fields . Creation Research Society Quarterly Journal. 21 (3). Psalm 19:1. * Dr.

Lisle is Director of Physical Sciences at the Institute for Creation Research and received his Ph.D. in astrophysics from the University of Colorado. Cite this article: Jason Lisle, Ph.D. 2014. The Solar System: Uranus . Acts & Facts. 43 (2). Rings Aren't Just for Planets, Anymore Rings Aren't Just for Planets, Anymore Rings Aren't Just for Planets, Anymore The Solar System Gets More Interesting the More We Study It The Centaur minor planet with its ring system. European Southern Observatory By Carolyn Collins Petersen Updated December 07, 2016. Saturn used to be the only place in the solar system we knew of that had rings. They gave it an eerie, alien appearance through a telescope. Then, using better telescopes and spacecraft missions that flew by the outer planets, astronomers found out that Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune also had ring systems. That spurred a great deal of scientific re-thinking about rings : how they form, how long they last, and what kinds of worlds could have them. Rings Around an Asteroid?

The situation is still changing, and in recent years, astronomers discovered a ring around a minor planet called Chariklo. It's what they call a Centaur-type asteroid. That's a small body in the solar system that crosses orbits with at least one giant planet. There are at least 44,000 of these little worldlets, each measuring at least a kilometer (0.6 miles) across or larger. Chariklo is quite large, about 260 kilometers (about 160 miles) across—and is the largest Centaur found so far. continue reading below our video 4 Tips for Improving Test Performance It orbits the Sun out between Saturn and Uranus. Centaurs are not dwarf planets like Ceres , but objects in their own right. How did Chariklo get its rings? It's an interesting question, especially since no one ever considered that such small bodies COULD have rings. The best idea put forth so far is that ancient Chariklo may have been involved in a collision with some object out in its neighborhood. That's not unusual— many worlds of the solar system were largely formed and shaped through collisions . Earth itself has been affected by collisions.

It's possible that a moon of one of the gas giants was tidally "shoved" into Chariklo's path. The resulting crash would have sent a lot of debris spinning out to space to settle into orbit around this little world. Another idea is that Chariklo could have experienced a kind of "cometary" activity when material from under its surface sprayed to space. It would have created the ring. Whatever happened, it left this world with a ring of particles that contain water ice and are only a few miles wide. Scientists have named the rings Oiapoque and Chui (after rivers in Brazil). Looking for Rings in Other Places So, do other Centaurs have rings? It would make sense to find more that do. They could be experiencing collisions and outgassing events that leave debris in orbit around them. Astronomers have looked around Chiron (the second-largest Centaur) and found evidence for a ring there, too. They used an event called a "stellar occultation" (where a distant star is covered by Chiron as it orbits the Sun). The light from the star is "occulted" not only by the Centaur, but also by any material (or even an atmosphere) around that world.

Something is blocking the light from the star , and that could be ring particles. It could also be a shell of gas and dust or possibly even some jets shooting material up from Chiron's surface. Chiron was the first one discovered, in 1977, and for a long time, astronomers assumed Centaurs were not active: no volcanism or tectonic activity. But, mysterious brightenings of Chiron set them to thinking again: maybe something's going on at them. Studies of light from occultations showed traces of water and dust at Chiron. Further studies turned up the tantalizing promise of a possible ring system. If they do exist, Chiron's two possible rings would stretch out some 300 kilometers (186 miles) from the center of Chiron, and would be about 3 and 7 kilometers (1.2 and 4.3 miles) wide. What could cause these rings? Certainly the jets of material that have been inferred from other observations could be populating a ring system. Astronomers see a similar "populating" going on at Saturn , where jets of material from the moon Enceladus are populating the nearby E ring .

It's also entirely possible that Chiron's rings (and those around other Centaurs, when found) could be the leftovers of their formation. That makes sense, since their formation involved collisions and close encounters between rocky bodies. This leaves a lot of work for astronomers to do, uncovering other rings and explaining the ones that do exist. The next steps will be to answer such questions as "How long will the rings last?" and "How are such rings sustained?" Scientists who are working on defining the rings around Chiron, will continue looking for more evidence and answers. Voyager Voyager Voyager Project Home Page Introduction The twin Voyager spacecraft, over the course of a dozen years, drew back the curtain on nearly half of the solar system . From launch in 1977 through the spectacular parting shots in 1989 of Neptune at the outer reaches of the solar system, this pair of gangly, instrument-laden spacecraft explored four planets -- Jupiter , Saturn , Uranus and Neptune -- as well as tens of moons, and the rings and magnetic environments of those planetary systems. The Voyagers were designed to take advantage of a rare geometric arrangement of the outer planets that occurs only once every 176 years.

This configuration allows a spacecraft to swing from one planet to the next without the need for large onboard propulsion systems; the flyby of each planet both accelerates the spacecraft and bends its flight path. Without this gravity assist, the flight time to Neptune would be 30 years. Voyager 2 was launched first, on August 20, 1977, followed by Voyager 1, which was put on a faster, shorter trajectory to Jupiter on September 5, 1977. Both launches took place at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Eighteen months after launch, Voyager 1 reached Jupiter, 650 million kilometers (400 million miles) away. The spacecraft made its closest approach on March 5, 1979, while Voyager 2 followed on July 9 of the same year. Images streaming back from the pair of spacecraft began to show the complicated, swirling turbulence of Jupiter's atmosphere in exquisite detail. A giant storm three times the size of Earth was raging in Jupiter's upper atmosphere, surrounded by rippling currents that rotated around it.

Voyager 1 made a startling discovery; it found nine active volcanoes erupting on Io , the innermost of Jupiter's four major moons. Four months later, Voyager 2 found that eight of the nine volcanoes were still erupting. Much to everyone's surprise, a thin, dusty ring was also discovered around Jupiter, forcing scientists to revise their thinking on the origins and mechanics of planetary ring systems. At Saturn , with its majestic rings, the Voyagers took high-resolution pictures to help scientists determine what the rings were made of and what kept them in orbit. Theories to explain planetary rings were being rewritten as fast as the images came down in November 1980 and August 1981, when Voyager 1 and 2, respectively, paid their visits to the gaseous giant. Saturn was the last planetary encounter for Voyager 1. Project controllers sent Voyager 1 on a trajectory that took it very close to Saturn's large moon Titan. That trajectory bent the spacecraft's path inexorably northward out of the ecliptic plane -- the plane in which most of the planets orbit the Sun.

However, JPL scientists and engineers were confident enough in Voyager 2 to send the aging probe on to Uranus and Neptune. At Uranus , the spacecraft photographed a world oddly tipped on its side, perhaps the result of a colossal primordial collision. Ten new moons were discovered in the Uranus system and the planet's magnetic field turned out to be nearly parallel to Uranus's axis of rotation. In August 1989, two and a half million kilometers (1.24 million miles) beyond Uranus, Voyager 2 sailed past Neptune , showing off the planet's surprisingly active atmosphere for the first time. Because the planet receives so little sunlight, scientists had expected to see a placid, featureless planet; instead, Voyager showed them a dynamic atmosphere with winds blowing westward, opposite the direction of rotation, at speeds faster than the winds of any other planet. Neptune revealed its Great Dark Spot for the first time, a storm system that resembled Jupiter's Great Red Spot , and a smaller, eastwardly moving cloud, called a "scooter," which was circling the planet about every 16 hours.

The blue planet was encircled in diffuse, dusty rings and six new moons were discovered orbiting along with the two that were already known, Nereid and Triton . As Voyager 2 passed Neptune and began its journey to the edge of the solar system, its camera was rotated to look back at the planets and take one last parting shot of the solar system. Voyager 2's "family portrait" illustrates the vastness of the solar system and the huge expanses of emptiness that lie between the outer planets. Both Voyagers are now headed for the outer boundary of the solar system, where the Sun no longer influences interplanetary space. That edge is thought to be somewhere between 8 billion and 23 billion kilometers (5 billion and 14 billion miles) beyond the Sun. Engineers are optimistic that the Voyagers will still be transmitting data when that boundary is encountered sometime in the first quarter of the 21st century. Voyager Images Voyager Spacecraft Model Twin Voyager spacecraft, depicted here in a full-scale model, are now traveling through the outer solar system. Voyager 1 has completed its mission to Jupiter and Saturn and is now outbound from the solar system.

Voyager 2 followed its sister craft to Jupiter and Saturn followed by encounters with Uranus and Neptune. In this view, the science boom, containing cameras and other instruments requiring pointing, is seen at right. The dominant feature at center, the 12-foot-diameter high-gain antenna, provides communication between the spacecraft and controllers on Earth. Just below is a shiny gold disk, a record called "Sounds of Earth," bearing messages and pictures from our planet. (Courtesy Calvin J. Hamilton/NASA) Voyager Spacecraft This image shows another view of a full-scale model of one of the Voyager spacecraft sent to explore the giant outer planets in our solar system. (Courtesy NASA) Voyager liftoff in Titan-Centaur This image shows the 1977 launch of one of the Voyager spacecrafts. From the NASA Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, Voyager 2 was launched first, on August 20, 1977; Voyager 1 was launched on a faster, shorter trajectory on September 5, 1977. Both Voyagers continue to explore interstellar space. They were delivered to space aboard Titan-Centaur expendable rockets.

(Courtesy NASA) The Sounds of Earth On the chance that someone is out there, NASA approved the placement of a phonograph record on each of the Voyager spacecraft. The recording, called "Sounds of Earth" fits on a 12-inch, copper disc containing greetings from Earth people in 60 languages, samples of music from different cultures and eras, and natural sounds of surf, wind and thunder, and birds, whales and other animals. The record also contains electronic information that an advanced technological civilization could convert into diagrams, pictures and printed words, including a message from President Carter. (Courtesy NASA) Views of the Solar System Copyright © 1995-2011 by Calvin J. Hamilton . All rights reserved. Privacy Statement . Planet Saturn | Solar System | Moon | Sky | Rings | Fact | Picture | Planets | NASA | Space Hate 0 In the solar system , Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun . It is also the second largest planet in the solar system following Jupiter . In 1610, Galileo first discovered Saturn with his telescope , but he didn't realize it had rings until looking at it a second time. Find out more cool info about this ringed planet right here!

Saturn - The Planet In order to go around the Sun once, Saturn takes 30 Earth years. Since it rotates twice as fast as Earth, its winds can reach speeds of 1,120 miles! That could blow away anything on Earth. Saturn is made up of only hydrogen and helium gas , which makes it very light compared to Earth. It has a density of 0.69. This light-as-a-feather planet has 30 moons, more than any other planet. Titan, one of Saturn's moons, is the second largest moon in the solar system. The most familiar of Saturn's moons include Rhea, Iapetus, Mimas, Enceladus, Tethys, Dione, Hyperion and Phoebe. Saturn's Composition Saturn - The Rings Saturn is known for its rings - all together it has seven. The ones that we can see from earth (using a telescope) are the two big rings and one faint one. We can see Saturn's rings because they are the brightest when compared to any other planet. From Earth we see these beautiful rings that look like hula-hoops , but Saturn's rings are actually many particles all going around in orbit and aren't solid at all.

Scientists say that the rings are composed mainly of ice particles. The rings are 250,000 km in diameter and are less than a kilometer thick. But Saturn is not the only planet with rings. In 1977, it was discovered that Uranus , Neptune and Jupiter all have rings around them but none are as visible as Saturn's many rings. Saturn has 7 rings Saturn - Major Discovery NASA , the American space agency, first visited Saturn with Pioneer 11 in 1979. This was followed by Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. Today, a NASA spacecraft called Cassini circles Saturn and will be doing this until 2007. On March 9, 2006, news came that water had been found on one of Saturn's moons, Enceladus. Pictures were taken showing that water was erupting out of the surface of the moon. This is significant because scientists have been looking to find other planets that may support life. Saturn - Did U Know? In Roman mythology, Saturn is the god of agriculture. In Greek mythology , Saturn is Cronus, the son of Uranus and Gaia.

He is also the father of Jupiter who is also known as Zeus . Ever wonder where the word Saturday comes from? Yup, your fave day of the week is also named for the god of agriculture. Saturn could fit 750 earths into it. One day on Saturn is about 10 Earth-hours. To see Saturn in the night sky, look to the southeast and look for the brightest star. That's Saturn. Related Stories:

Question: In March 1977, the rings of which planet in our solar system were discovered?
Answer: Uranus