Related papers: Origin and Evolution of Saturn's Ring System
Until about a decade ago, ring systems were only known to exist around giant planets. Each one of the four giant planets harbours its own distinctive and unique system of rings and inner satellites. The past decade has been marked by the…
We investigate the long-term and large-scale viscous evolution of dense planetary rings using a simple 1D numerical code. We use a physically realistic viscosity model derived from N-body simulations (Daisaka et al., 2001), and dependent on…
Images obtained by the Cassini spacecraft between 2012 and 2015 reveal a periodic brightness variation in a region of Saturn's D ring that previously appeared to be rather featureless. Furthermore, the intensity and radial wavenumber of…
A new model for the shape of the prominent eccentric ringlet in the gap exterior to Saturn's B-ring is developed based on Cassini imaging observations taken over about 8 years. Unlike previous treatments, the new model treats each edge of…
As it has already done for Earth, the sun, and the stars, seismology has the potential to radically change the way the interiors of giant planets are studied. In a sequence of events foreseen by only a few, observations of Saturn's rings by…
Previous investigations of Saturn's outer D ring (73,200-74,000 km from Saturn's center) identified periodic brightness variations whose radial wavenumber increased linearly over time. This pattern was attributed to a vertical corrugation,…
Saturn is ringing weakly. Exquisite data from the Cassini mission reveal the presence of f-mode oscillations as they excite density waves in Saturn's rings. These oscillations have displacement amplitudes of order a metre on Saturn's…
The dynamics of Saturn's F Ring have been a matter of curiosity ever since Voyagers 1 and 2 sent back pictures of the ring's unusual features. Some of these images showed three distinct ringlets with the outer two displaying a kinked and…
The formation and orbital evolution of Saturn's inner mid-sized moons are still debated. The most puzzling aspects are 1) how the Tethys-Dione pair and the Mimas-Enceladus pair passed through their strong 3:2 mean-motion resonances during…
Planetary rings are the only nearby astrophysical disks, and the only disks that have been investigated by spacecraft. Although there are significant differences between rings and other disks, chiefly the large planet/ring mass ratio that…
Saturn's inner B-ring and its C-ring support wavetrains of contrasting amplitudes but with similar length scales, 100-1000 km. In addition, the inner B-ring is punctuated by two intriguing `flat' regions between radii 93,000 km and 98,000…
Saturns F-ring is a unique, narrow ring that lies (radially) close to the tidally disruptive Roche limit of water ice for Saturn. Significant work has been done that shows it to be one of the most dynamic places in the Solar System.…
Saturn's mid-sized moons (satellites) have a puzzling orbital configuration with trapping in mean-motion resonances with every other pairs (Mimas-Tethys 4:2 and Enceladus-Dione 2:1). To reproduce their current orbital configuration on the…
In a previous paper (Hedman and Nicholson 2013), we developed tools that allowed us to confirm that several of the waves in Saturn's rings were likely generated by resonances with fundamental sectoral normal modes inside Saturn itself. Here…
Catastrophic collisions between proto-satellites have been proposed as a possible origin of Saturn's rings. This argument relies on the concept of the equivalent circular orbit. Here, we re-examine the post-impact dynamical evolution of…
The $\mu$ and $\nu$ rings of Uranus form a secondary ring-moon system with the satellites Puck, Mab,Portia, and Rosalind. These rings are tenuous and dominated by micrometric particles, which can be strongly disturbed by the solar radiation…
Certain spiral density waves in Saturn's rings are generated through resonances with planetary normal modes, making them valuable probes of Saturn's internal structure. Previous research has primarily focused on the rotation rates of these…
We present results from large-scale particle simulations of the viscous overstability in Saturn's rings. The overstability generates a variety of structure on scales covering a few hundred metres to several kilometres, including…
The thermal inertia values of Saturn's main rings (the A, B, and C rings and the Cassini division) are derived by applying our thermal model to azimuthally scanned spectra taken by the Cassini Composite Infrared Spectrometer (CIRS). Model…
At the solar equinox in August 2009, the Composite Infrared Spectrometer (CIRS) onboard Cassini showed the lowest Saturn's ring temperatures ever observed. Detailed radiative transfer models show that the observed equinox temperatures of…