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Seventh planet has a blue ring
BBC ^ | April 7, 2006 | Helen Briggs

Posted on 04/08/2006 4:03:32 PM PDT by NYer

Astronomers have discovered that the planet Uranus has a blue ring - only the second found in the Solar System.

Like the blue ring of Saturn, it probably owes its existence to an accompanying small moon.

Scientists suspect subtle forces acting on dust in the rings allow smaller particles to persist while larger ones are recaptured by the moon.

Smaller particles reflect blue light, giving the ring its distinctive colour, the US team reports in Science.

All other rings - those around Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune - are made up of both large and small particles, making the rings reddish in appearance.

Bright blue

Astronomers have long known that the gas giant Uranus is surrounded by rings of dark particulate matter up to ten metres in diameter.

But last December, two new rings - the planet's twelfth and thirteenth - were discovered using the Hubble Space Telescope.

Astronomers observed the ring system at infrared wavelengths with the Keck telescope, in Hawaii.

The outermost ring, and its ice-bound moon Mab, could not be observed in infrared light unlike the red inner ring.

A team led by Imke de Pater, professor of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley, found that the ring was bright blue, something of an oddity in planetary terms.

"The blue colour says that this ring is predominantly submicron-sized material, much smaller than the material in most other rings, which appear red," Professor de Pater said.

The tiny particles - less than a thousandth of the width of a human hair - scatter and reflect predominantly blue light, much like the very small molecules in the air that make the Earth's sky blue.

The more common rings are reddish because they also contain many larger particles, which gives the reflected light its colour, and may be made up of reddish material, perhaps from iron.

It appears that the outer blue rings of Saturn and Uranus are strikingly similar, not least because they are both associated with small moons.

Moon dance

"The moon orbits the planet in the ring," Professor de Pater told the BBC News website.

"It is continuously impacted by very tiny particles [micrometeorites]. On a moon that doesn't have any atmosphere these tiny particles impact the moon at high velocity, and throw stuff up into space.

"Because the moon is so small, it escapes the moon and goes into orbit around the planet.

"The smaller particles stay in orbit around the planet but the larger particles smash back into the moon."

The work was carried out in collaboration with Mark Showalter, of the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (Seti) Institute in California; Heidi Hammel, of the Space Science Institute, Colorado; and Seran Gibbard, of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California.

The scientists plan to carry out further observations next year, when the faint rings of Uranus will be more visible.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; News/Current Events; US: California; US: Colorado; US: Hawaii
KEYWORDS: astronomy; berkeley; california; colorado; hawaii; heidihammel; helenbriggs; hst; imkedepater; jupiter; kecktelescope; llc; mab; markshowalter; moonsofuranus; neptune; planets; ringarounduranus; rings; saturn; science; serangibbard; seti; sirwilliamherschel; telescope; thehubble; uofcalifornia; uranus; williamherschel
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To: Larry Lucido

You would think that would get infected...


21 posted on 04/08/2006 5:45:19 PM PDT by bondjamesbond (RICE 2008)
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To: NYer
Uranus has a blue ring

Yikes! Is there a cream for that?

22 posted on 04/08/2006 5:47:11 PM PDT by Stultis (I don't worry about the war turning into "Vietnam" in Iraq; I worry about it doing so in Congress.)
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To: Verginius Rufus
Yeah they named it for the most obscure god they could find.

Why not Quirinus?

23 posted on 04/08/2006 5:56:50 PM PDT by Harmless Teddy Bear (Sign up to donate monthly and you will be automatically entered in our "Win a Bear Hug Contest")
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To: NYer

Men are from Mars, women are from Venus...


24 posted on 04/08/2006 5:59:05 PM PDT by decimon
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To: NYer
Blue rings?

Totally unexpected. I would think blue balls in the vicinity a more likely occurrence.

25 posted on 04/08/2006 6:06:57 PM PDT by dersepp (I Am A Militia Of One)
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To: NYer

"up to ten meters"

It's a neat looking picture but that blue ring would be hundreds of miles across...


26 posted on 04/08/2006 6:16:57 PM PDT by dangus
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To: Verginius Rufus

I'm guessing the king wasn't too thrilled with that turn of events!

:I'm suggesting we name it King George
:I'm suggesting we name it your ...


27 posted on 04/08/2006 6:19:11 PM PDT by dangus
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To: saganite

Ah, jokes about Uranus always lead to blue humor...


28 posted on 04/08/2006 6:20:10 PM PDT by dangus
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To: NYer

Well at least red, white, and blue are our colors.


29 posted on 04/08/2006 6:34:22 PM PDT by ARCADIA (Abuse of power comes as no surprise)
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To: Harmless Teddy Bear
Why did Bode have to go for the Greek version?

Must... not... say... it...

30 posted on 04/08/2006 6:47:38 PM PDT by wyattearp (Study! Study! Study! Or BONK, BONK, on the head!)
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To: wyattearp

We thank you.


31 posted on 04/08/2006 6:50:38 PM PDT by Harmless Teddy Bear (Sign up to donate monthly and you will be automatically entered in our "Win a Bear Hug Contest")
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To: Harmless Teddy Bear

Caelus? Naw, Urectum would be much better. Or Urethra, or Ureter. Or Roto Rooter. Or ru-ru. Death by ru-ru! The King has spoken.


32 posted on 04/08/2006 6:51:28 PM PDT by ovrtaxt (Join the FR folding team!! http://vspx27.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/main.py?qtype=teampage&teamnum=36120)
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To: NYer

Insert your obligatory Klingon joke here...


33 posted on 04/08/2006 6:52:33 PM PDT by WestVirginiaRebel (Common sense will do to liberalism what the atomic bomb did to Nagasaki-Rush Limbaugh)
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To: Harmless Teddy Bear
I'm sure there are a lot of Greek and Roman gods even more obscure than Quirinus. Quirinus is a provincial name, known to the Romans but not to the Greeks...the other planets bore name of important gods so Bode probably felt he had to follow suit.

Bode found that earlier astronomers had noted the location of Uranus without realizing that the object they were looking at was a planet...the earliest example was in 1690 when Flamsteed entered it on a chart as a star in the constellation Taurus, 34 Tauri.

So we could call Uranus "34 Tauri" (or Triginta Quattuor for short).

34 posted on 04/08/2006 7:10:42 PM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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To: Blood of Tyrants

Must be mold.


35 posted on 04/08/2006 8:17:05 PM PDT by GSlob
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To: NYer
Blue ring around Uranus? Hmmmm, are these guys involved?


36 posted on 04/08/2006 9:47:49 PM PDT by JRios1968 (E=mc3...the origin of "friends don't let friends derive drunk.")
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To: NYer

"Next, we'll check that blue ring..."

37 posted on 04/08/2006 9:50:55 PM PDT by JRios1968 (E=mc3...the origin of "friends don't let friends derive drunk.")
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