A recent study suggests that Earth's moon may have once possessed rings similar to those of Saturn.

2025-04-02 10:03:54 By Michael Brown

Recent research suggests that moons within our solar system might have possessed rings in the past, similar to those found around planets, raising intriguing questions about the absence of ringed moons in the present day.

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A depiction of a moon resembling Earth’s satellite, encircled by shimmering icy rings. Recent studies indicate that this scenario might have been a feasible existence for several moons within our solar system.

None of the moons in our solar system possess rings today. But a new study indicates that such rings, if created, could remain stable for a million years, even while being gravitationally pulled by other solar system objects. The findings deepen the mystery of why these satellites are now ring-free.

Rings surround many members of our planetary family. Saturn is perhaps the best-known example, swathed by eight main rings made of thousands of smaller ringlets, but the other three outer planets also possess rings, the Voyager space missions revealed. Composed of chunks of ice and rocks of varying sizes, these ring systems are maintained by small shepherding moons, whose gravitational forces tug the chunks and tweak their positions.

More recent studies using ground-based telescopes have revealed rings encircling several centaurs — asteroids beyond Jupiter’s orbit — and minor planets, including the egg-shaped Haumea. Even Earth and Mars may once have had rings. However, no study so far has definitively spotted rings around any of the solar system's 300-odd moons. (A 2008 study claiming that Jupiter's moon Rhea possessed a ring turned out to be a false alarm.)

This absence is all the more intriguing because the physical processes that create rings can theoretically occur on both planets and their satellites. A ring can form around an object when debris starts orbiting it, said Matthew Tiscareno, a planetary scientist at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California. This debris could be kicked up from the body's surface following an asteroid or comet collision, or may consist of icy plumes ejected by powerful cryovolcanoes. Over time, gravitational forces along the body's equatorial bulge flatten out the debris into a ring, Tiscareno told Live Science in an email. But lots of moons have suffered asteroid impacts or have cryovolcanoes — and yet, they remain ringless.

The search for the elusive lunar rings

These observations prompted Mario Sucerquia, an astrophysicist at France's Grenoble Alpes University, and colleagues to investigate whether moon rings could be stable at all. A 2022 study Sucerquia co-authored found that theoretically, isolated moons could have stable rings around them. But that study didn't consider the gravitational effects of other moons and planets.

To investigate this, in the new study published Oct. 30, 2024 in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics. Sucerquia and colleagues selected five sets of spherical moons and their neighboring planets, including Earth and the moon. For each set, the team added rings to all the satellites, then simulated how the rings would behave over a million years, while being pulled gravitationally by their parent moon, other nearby moons and the planet. The researchers also calculated how chaotically the ring particles moved over a millennium, to determine the rings' stability.

The researchers expected to find that the rings were unstable, but the model showed that, barring a few moons, including Saturn's "Death Star" moon Mimas, these moon rings were stable — particularly Jupiter’s Iapetus. Even Earth's moon had a 95% chance of supporting a stable ring system in the simulations.

Sucerquia shared with Live Science via email, "[W]e were not expecting that moons situated in a challenging gravitational setting, influenced by numerous other moons and planets, would be able to preserve stability in their rings." He added, however, that "instead of obliterating the rings, these harsh environments have enhanced their beauty by forming intricate structures such as gaps and waves, akin to what we see in Saturn's rings."

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Currently, none of the 293 moons in our solar system, as illustrated in this image, possess permanent rings.

What happened to all the rings?

So why don't the moons have rings today? The authors suggest that non-gravitational factors, including the sun's radiation and charged particles from the magnetic fields of the moons' parent planets, caused any previous rings to disintegrate.

There are differing opinions regarding the conclusions of the study. Tiscareno, who did not participate in the research, believes that over time, the rings were probably disrupted by the gravitational forces exerted by the moons that orbit the planet.

"Because most solar system moons rotate very slowly (keeping the same face towards their planet as they orbit, as our moon does to Earth), any ring particles must be orbiting the moon much faster than the moon spins," he said. So gravitational tugs from the parent moons, over long stretches of time, would "cause the ring particle orbits to decay until they eventually impact the surface of the moon," he said. In other words, if our moon ever had rings, they crashed to the lunar surface long ago.

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Astronomers plan to continue their exploration of the intriguing red dots. Notably, these objects start to show up in significant quantities approximately 600 million years post-Big Bang, only to see a dramatic decrease in their numbers around 900 million years later, which corresponds to 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang. What could be the reason behind this? Are they possibly being hidden from our view? Webb scientists will continue weighing their novel observations with our understanding of how the universe works. Dale Kocevski, an astronomer from Colby College in Waterville, Maine, who spearheaded the research, remarked, "There are often multiple ways to interpret the puzzling characteristics of the little red dots. It's an ongoing dialogue between theoretical models and observational data, striving to achieve a harmony between what corresponds effectively and what contradicts." The remarkable capabilities of the Webb telescope The Webb telescope — a scientific collaboration between NASA, ESA, and the Canadian Space Agency — is designed to peer into the deepest cosmos and reveal new insights about the early universe. It's also examining intriguing planets in our galaxy, along with the planets and moons in our solar system. Here's how Webb is achieving unparalleled feats, and likely will for decades to come: - Giant mirror: Webb's mirror, which captures light, is over 21 feet across. That's over two-and-a-half times larger than the Hubble Space Telescope's mirror. Capturing more light allows Webb to see more distant, ancient objects. The telescope is peering at stars and galaxies that formed over 13 billion years ago, just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. "We're going to see the very first stars and galaxies that ever formed," Jean Creighton, an astronomer and the director of the Manfred Olson Planetarium at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, told Mashable in 2021. - Infrared view: Unlike Hubble, which largely views light that's visible to us, Webb is primarily an infrared telescope, meaning it views light in the infrared spectrum. This allows us to see far more of the universe. Infrared has longer wavelengths than visible light, so the light waves more efficiently slip through cosmic clouds; the light doesn't as often collide with and get scattered by these densely packed particles. Ultimately, Webb's infrared eyesight can penetrate places Hubble can't. "It reveals the truth," Creighton remarked. - Peering into distant exoplanets: The Webb telescope carries specialized equipment called spectrographs that will revolutionize our understanding of these far-off worlds. The instruments can decipher what molecules (such as water, carbon dioxide, and methane) exist in the atmospheres of distant exoplanets — be they gas giants or smaller rocky worlds. Webb looks at exoplanets in the Milky Way galaxy. Who knows what we'll find? "We might learn things we never thought about," Mercedes López-Morales, an exoplanet researcher and astrophysicist at the Center for Astrophysics-Harvard & Smithsonian, told Mashable in 2021. Already, astronomers have successfully found intriguing chemical reactions on a planet 700 light-years away, and have started looking at one of the most anticipated places in the cosmos: the rocky, Earth-sized planets of the TRAPPIST solar system.

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Unveiling the Remarkable Strength of Celtic Women and Their Daughters

Bournemouth University View pictures in App save up to 80% data. Numerous female skeletons were discovered interred alongside precious items such as pottery. New research suggests that women in Britain 2,000 years ago may have transferred land and wealth to their daughters rather than their sons, indicating that communities were organized around maternal lineage. Skeletons discovered in Dorset revealed DNA evidence indicating that Celtic men relocated to reside with the families and communities of their wives. Researchers discovered indications of an entire community that developed over generations centered on the female lineage of a family, likely tracing back to a single woman. "According to Dr. Lara Cassidy, the lead author of the study from Trinity College Dublin, this suggests that during the Iron Age in Britain, women held significant power and were capable of influencing the society's direction in various aspects." Bournemouth University View pictures in App save up to 80% data. The archaeologists were thrilled to discover skeletons remarkably well-preserved in the clay soil of Dorset. This marks the first documented instance of communities forming around women in ancient European history. Researchers suggest that the communities likely devoted significant resources to their daughters, anticipating that they would inherit their mothers' social standing. Dr. Cassidy remarks, "While it's quite uncommon in today's societies, this may not have always been true." The team discovered indications that it occurred in various locations across Britain, implying that it was prevalent. The communities examined thrived during the era of Boudica, the warrior queen who spearheaded a revolt against Roman forces in East Anglia circa AD 61. Dr. Cassidy analyzed the DNA extracted from the skeletal remains of 57 members of a tribe known as the Durotriges. This group inhabited Winterborne Kingston in Dorset during the period spanning from 100 BC to AD 100. A team of archaeologists from Bournemouth University excavated the skeletons from a burial site. Through the analysis of mitochondrial DNA, which is inherited exclusively from mothers, Dr. Cassidy discovered that the majority of women in the community share a familial connection that stretches back several generations. In contrast, the Y chromosomes exhibited significant diversity, which is inherited from father to son, suggesting that men from various families integrated into the community through marriage. Bournemouth University View pictures in App save up to 80% data. The remains of individuals from the Durotriges tribe were remarkably well-preserved. The DNA examination suggests that the majority of the ancestral lineage can be traced back to one particular woman. The findings suggest that this society operated under a matrilocal structure, where a husband would relocate to reside within his wife's community. Dr. Cassidy states, "One of the most apparent advantages for a woman is that by staying at home, she maintains her support network. Her parents, siblings, and family members remain close by." "Your husband is the one entering the picture; he is the unfamiliar face in the community and relies on your family for his support and land," she continues. The researchers discovered similar evidence of matrilocality in skeletal remains from additional burial sites, including those located in Cornwall and Yorkshire. She argues that instances of influential women in ancient societies have frequently been overlooked as isolated cases rather than the standard, but these discoveries call that perspective into question. Archaeologists Professor Miles Russell and Professor Martin Smith discovered additional proof indicating that women held a significant status. Bournemouth University View pictures in App save up to 80% data. Researchers from Trinity College and Bournemouth conducted excavations and analyses on the remains of 57 individuals. "We find quite elaborately furnished graves with high status objects of wealth. Every time we find that, it occurs in women's graves, so we think wealth was being transferred down the female line," says Prof Martin Smith at Bournemouth University. The results also support ancient Roman texts that indicated women in Britain held considerable power, arguably even greater than that of their counterparts in Rome. However, Romans such as Julius Caesar considered that to be a mark of primitiveness. "According to Professor Miles Russell from Bournemouth University, 'Women in Britain held significant power, contributing to a more egalitarian society. This was a major issue for the Romans, who lived in a highly patriarchal culture. To the Romans, this characteristic made the Britons appear as the epitome of barbarism.'" Most societies today follow a patrilocal structure, where women relocate to the communities of their husbands. However, certain matrilocal communities can still be found today or have existed in the recent past, such as the Akans in Ghana, West Africa, and the Cherokee in North America. Researchers suggest that Iron Age Britain might have been matrilocal, as men were often absent due to warfare. Dr. Cassidy likens it to World War II, a time when women experienced an increase in their political and economic influence. According to her, matrilocal societies tend to have a lower likelihood of facing internal conflicts. "It has the potential to foster a sense of togetherness among nearby communities and villages. By separating clusters of related males, it prevents the formation of deep bonds and the onset of conflicts with neighboring related males," she proposes. The results have been released in the scientific publication Nature. Follow Georgina on Blue Sky.

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