More evidence Mars once had a ring

[Still Waters]

Scientists from the SETI Institute and Purdue University have found that the only way to produce Deimos’s unusually tilted orbit is for Mars to have had a ring billions of years ago. While some of the more massive planets in our solar system have giant rings and numerous big moons, Mars only has two small, misshapen moons, Phobos and Deimos. Although these moons are small, their peculiar orbits hide important secrets about their past.

For a long time, scientists believed that Mars's two moons,  discovered in 1877, were captured asteroids. However, since their orbits are almost in the same plane as Mars’s equator, that the moons must have formed at the same time as Mars. But the orbit of the smaller, more distant moon Deimos is tilted by two degrees.

“The fact that Deimos’s orbit is not exactly in plane with Mars’s equator was considered unimportant, and nobody cared to try to explain it,” says lead author Matija Ćuk, a research scientist at the SETI Institute. “But once we had a big new idea and we looked at it with new eyes, Deimos’s orbital tilt revealed its big secret.”

https://www.seti.org/press-release/martian-moons-orbit-hints-ancient-ring-mars

[+OverSword]

Interesting theory.

[DreadLordAvatar]

Because of the time scale, anything is possible.  Like how Mars was once a moon of  Earth....both planets flourished for eons until the martians lost the war ...and the planet lost orbit and has settled to where it remains today.  It’s a valid theory like this article.

[Waspie_Dwarf]

3 hours ago, DreadLordAvatar said:

Because of the time scale, anything is possible.  Like how Mars was once a moon of  Earth....both planets flourished for eons until the martians lost the war ...and the planet lost orbit and has settled to where it remains today.  It’s a valid theory like this article.

It's not a valid theory like the article as it has no supporting evidence, and, in fact, contradicts the observed evidence. 

[XenoFish]

I wonder if all the impact craters on Mars surface are due to the cycle that was mentioned. (if I was reading it right, no promises)

[bison]

Both the asteroid capture and conventional formed-in-place explanations for Mars' moons seem unsatisfactory. The moons both orbit very close to the planet's equator, in nearly circular orbits, which would be highly unlikely if they were asteroids, coming in at random. Even asteroids from close to the ecliptic place of the solar system would probably end up at with higher  inclinations to the equator, since Mars' equator is inclined 25 degrees to the ecliptic. 

If Mars' moons simply formed in place, one wonder why they should orbit the Red Planet substantially faster than the planet rotates.Their orbital speeds would presumably be derived from the motion of the same gyre in the Solar Nebula  as Mars. 

A primordial asteroid collision with Mars could have thrown up an orbital cloud of debris, which condensed into the moons we see today.

  

[micahc]

mars is flat.

[jethrofloyd]

4 hours ago, micahc said:

mars is flat.

In fact, we are living in the Flat Solar System.

[Emma_Acid]

14 hours ago, DreadLordAvatar said:

Because of the time scale, anything is possible.  Like how Mars was once a moon of  Earth....both planets flourished for eons until the martians lost the war ...and the planet lost orbit and has settled to where it remains today.  It’s a valid theory like this article.

You need to look up the definitions of "valid theory" and "science fiction"