Astronomers Just Spotted an Asteroid With Two Rings

Here is a bit more background into this finding and how it relates to what astronomers thought they knew:

The rings of Saturn are one of the most spectacular sights in the sky, and less prominent rings have also been found around the other giant planets. Despite many careful searches, no rings had been found around smaller objects orbiting the Sun in the Solar System. Now observations of the distant minor planet Chariklo as it passed in front of a star have shown that this object too is surrounded by two fine rings.

Chariklo is the largest member of a class known as the Centaurs and it orbits between Saturn and Uranus in the outer Solar System. The astronomers found much more than they were expecting. A few seconds before, and again a few seconds after the main occultation there were two further very short dips in the star’s apparent brightness. Something around Chariklo was blocking the light! By comparing what was seen from different sites the team could reconstruct not only the shape and size of the object itself but also the shape, width, orientation and other properties of the newly discovered rings.

Whoa!  Do you think this could be related to Planet X or any other mysterious speculations at the edge of the solar system?  Or is it pretty basic?

Enjoy the video and check back for updates.



One Comment;

  1. David Hua Ken Cheng said:

    An asteroid with rings – nothing unusual. This piece of rock (Chariklo) – classified under a class known as centaurs – Is too small to be a dwarf – too big to be a asteroid. May not have a magnetic core but perhaps just a piece of rock with magnetic properties and a electromagnetic field.

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