Recycling Extends Ring Lifetimes

[Lionel]

Although rings around planets like Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are relatively short-lived, new evidence implies that the recycling of orbiting debris can lengthen the lifetime of such rings, according to University of Colorado researchers. Strong evidence now implies small moons near the giant planets like Saturn and Jupiter are essentially piles of rubble, said Larry Esposito, a professor at CU-Boulder's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics. These re-constituted small bodies are the source of material for planetary rings. Previous calculations by Esposito and LASP Research Associate Joshua Colwell showed the short lifetimes for such moons imply that the solar system is nearly at the end of the age of rings. "These philosophically unappealing results may not truly describe our solar system and the rings that may surround giant extra-solar planets," said Esposito. "Our new calculations of models explain how inclusion of recycling can lengthen the lifetime of rings and moons."

The observations from the Voyager and Galileo space missions showed a variety of rings surrounding each of the giant planets, including Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. The rings are mixed in each case with small moons.

"It is clear that the small moons not only sculpt the rings through their gravity, but are also the parents of the ring material," said Esposito. "In each ring system, destructive processes like grinding, darkening and spreading are acting so rapidly that the rings must be much younger than the planets they circle."

Numerical models by Esposito and Colwell from the 1990's showed a "collisional cascade," where a planet's moons are broken into smaller moons when struck by asteroids or comets. The fragments then are shattered to form the particles in new rings. The rings themselves are subsequently ground to dust, which is swept away.

But according to Colwell, "Some of the fragments that make up the rings may be re-accreted instead of being ground to dust. New evidence shows some debris has accumulated into moons or moonlets rather than disappearing through collisional erosion."

"This process has proceeded rapidly," said Esposito. "The typical ring is younger than a few hundred million years, the blink of an eye compared to the planets, which are 4.5 billion years old. The question naturally arises why rings still exist, to be photographed in such glory by visiting human spacecraft that have arrived lately on the scene," he said.

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