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Surprise discovery in the outer Solar System

zooterkin

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zooterkin
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Press conference later today from the European Southern Observatory. (Tip-off from a friend who used to work at NASA.)

An international team of astronomers, led by Felipe Braga-Ribas (Observatório Nacional/MCTI, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), has used telescopes at seven locations in South America, including the 1.54-metre Danish and TRAPPIST telescopes at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile, to make a surprise discovery in the outer Solar System.

This unexpected result raises several unanswered questions and is expected to provoke much debate. A press conference will be held in Brazil to present the new results and allow opportunities for questions.

Note that all information regarding these findings is under strict embargo until 19:00 CET (15:00 BRT) on Wednesday 26 March 2014.

When: The conference will be held on 26 March 2014 at 14:30 local time (BRT) and will take place in Portuguese with a summary in English.

Who: The conference presenters are:

Felipe Braga-Ribas, Observatório Nacional/MCTI, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Bruno Sicardy, LESIA, Observatoire de Paris, CNRS, Paris, France
Prof. Roberto Martins, Observatório Nacional/MCTI, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Prof. Julio Camargo, Observatório Nacional/MCTI, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
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What have they found? Another planet? Bigfoot's spaceship?
 
Ah, looks like someone published, and then pulled the page. Visible in google cache (currently) is this:
The European Southern Observatory announced this week the discovery of rings around an asteroid 1.4 billion miles from Earth. Chariklo is the largest of the class of asteroids orbiting the sun between Saturn and Uranus known as Centaurs. Results were published online today in the journal Nature.

Rings are not an unusual feature in the solar system. Each of the outer planets: Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune and of course Saturn have rings. However Chariklo is the smallest ringed body found to date.

Just 160 miles wide, Chariklo's ring system spans 12 miles with a five-mile gap between two dense rings.

"We weren't looking for a ring and didn't think small bodies like Chariklo had them at all, so the discovery – and the amazing amount of detail we saw in the system – came as a complete surprise!" says Felipe Braga-Ribas (Observatório Nacional/MCTI) author of the paper.
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I'm assuming this is a short-lived feature. Unless it can be established that something replenishes the rings. What is the life span of Saturn's rings?
I'd thought I'd read somewhere it was expected to last roughly ten thousand years. Which makes the fact that we're around now to see them extra cool.
 
Monketey Ghost said:
I'm assuming this is a short-lived feature. Unless it can be established that something replenishes the rings. What is the life span of Saturn's rings?
I'd thought I'd read somewhere it was expected to last roughly ten thousand years. Which makes the fact that we're around now to see them extra cool.
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It's not 100% pinned down, but I think most tend to primordial origins. There were some comments out of a conference late last year that Cassini data supports the 4+ billion year age. But I had difficulty tracking down any direct presentation on it, just reports about it.

ETA: My statement is only about Saturn's rings. The specific features that support their age may not be relevant to any other ring system.
 
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The rings are described as dense and narrow. Dense- makes me wonder if outgassing could be enough to account for it.
Hm. Can't wait for further info.
 
C_Felix said:
So...what are we up to?
8 "real" planets
and 5 dwarfs?
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That's the official (IAU) tally, but there's quite a few bodies that are likely to be dwarf planets, but we don't have enough data yet to confirm that they fit the definition.
 
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