Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

CTOnews.com Oct. 14-Scientists have uncovered a new mystery about Uranus 'rings, fascinating rings buried in a collection of long-forgotten NASA Voyager 2 data.

In January 1986, Voyager 2 flew past Uranus and discovered 10 moons and its two rings (δ and Zeta), becoming the first and only spacecraft to visit the ice-covered giant planet.

At the time, it returned data showing a ring of stars known to scientists as the zeta ring, which has eluded astronomers for nearly 20 years. Of course, the zeta ring has not moved far from Earth in these 20 years, but it has not been observed by humans.

Until last year, researchers received an unexpected gift: a new image of Uranus 'ring system, including the elusive Zeta ring, courtesy of Ian Regan.

"For a long time, we thought Voyager 2 had only taken two pictures of this ring," Matthew Heidman, a planetary scientist at the University of Idaho, said at the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society's Division of Planetary Sciences on Oct. 5. This suggests that there is still a lot of information encoded in the Voyager data that deserves to be revisited. "

Weak Uranus ring system. Scientists initially missed this major discovery because it had not been detected in any of the images, even in the red dust ring closest to Uranus, because a large number of images had to be combined to produce this feature.

"He took hundreds of photos and eventually stacked them together to form this picture of the Uranus system," Heidman said."This is the most comprehensive view of the zeta ring in existence, and we didn't even know it existed in the Voyager data for decades. "

CTOnews.com has learned that the new image, which combines the first two Voyager images, gives Hedman and his colleagues enough information to calculate the distance of the rings from Uranus, about 23,000 miles (37,000 kilometers) away, and estimate its brightness.

But both numbers are puzzling. The Keck Observatory in Hawaii collected observations of the zeta ring for the first time since 2007. These observations show that Saturn's rings are located 25000 miles (40000 kilometers) above Uranus, slightly further away than Voyager 2 observations suggest.

"The point is that the position of the ring doesn't match the Voyager images," Heidman said of Keck's observations. "This ring has changed a bit over the course of 20 years. But we're still not entirely sure what it is. "

"It became significantly brighter, which means dust entered the system sometime during these 20 years," Heidman said. "What's going on? "We don't know now. "

Hedman believes Uranus may have been shattered by a space rock impact and landed on the zeta ring, or it may have been caused by seasonal changes, but both are speculation. Whatever happened, there must have been enough drama to affect the halo, but also to keep it from scientists.

NASA will begin planning a major mission to explore the Uranus system in the next few years, but due to limited human power, scientists will not be able to obtain the mission data for decades. Headman noted that the James Webb Space Telescope captured dazzling images of rings around Neptune released in September.

"Fortunately, there is a telescope that seems to be very good at looking at dust rings around planets," he said. "So that's probably good news. "

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