Saturn’s Rings Could Be Billions Of Years Old, Making Them The Same Age As The Planet Itself
The rings of Saturn could be much older than previously believed, possibly as old as the planet itself. In 2004, when NASA’s Cassini probe arrived to study Saturn, it discovered that the ice chunks and particles of the rings were free of the cosmic dust that scientists expected to find.
Their pristine appearance led the scientists to assume that the rings were very young, somewhere between 100 and 400-million-years-old.
But now, experts from the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science in Japan and the French National Center for Scientific Research have found that the rings are ancient after all.
“Data from the Cassini spacecraft suggested the rings might be young because they appear so clean, and many people simply accepted that conclusion. However, our theoretical work now shows that a clean appearance does not necessarily mean the rings are young,” said Ryuki Hyodo, a planetary scientist from the Japanese institute.
“So, I think this is an important insight for guiding future planetary exploration missions; you better not be fooled by its first glance.”
Saturn’s rings are more resistant to contamination from cosmic dust than previously thought, so they can stay clean-looking for a long time.
Hyodo and his colleagues have not yet calculated an age for the rings, but they believe the rings could be as old as the planet, which is around 4.5 billion years old.
The assumption that Saturn’s rings were relatively young stemmed from the lack of dust that would’ve come from high-speed meteorites constantly slamming into the ice of the rings.
The research team wanted to determine the cause of the rings’ youthful appearance, so they created theoretical models to test what would happen if dust particles smashed into the rings at top speed, accelerated by Saturn’s gravity.
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They found that the collision would result in such extreme temperatures that any dust would be vaporized immediately. The vapor would spread out in a cloud and then condense into charged nanoparticles.
The team also simulated how the particles would travel through Saturn’s magnetic field and discovered that only a small amount settled onto the rings. The rest were shot into space or pulled back into Saturn’s atmosphere.
“In the end, micrometeoroid material (darkening material of rings), now in the form of nanoparticles and ions, either slam into the planet or escape into Saturn’s atmosphere or out into space. In conclusion, the rings hardly get darkened by micrometeoroid impact,” said Hyodo.
If this is the case, Saturn’s rings could be billions of years old. It would be easier to explain the formation of the rings if they are indeed older. Billions of years ago, the solar system was much more chaotic.
As a result, the odds of a collision event between asteroids or baby planets were more likely. A collision would’ve created debris clouds that gathered around Saturn and became its rings.
Further research is needed to confirm these questions about Saturn and its rings. Currently, the researchers are simulating micrometeoroid impacts on icy particles to lend more support to their latest findings.
The study was published in Nature Geoscience.
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