The Formation of Rings Around Planets
Rings are one of the oldest forms of adornment used by women throughout the centuries. In fact, rings have a long history in the human body. They come in many different varieties, such as flat bands, which are circular, and engravings that are placed around a central stone. The stones may be set into the metal or gems to create an array of styles and patterns.
The moon has been a major player in the formation and design of rings. The moon has an effect on the atomic composition of a moon forming a variety of space rock types. When astronauts brought back moon rocks from the Moon, many rings bore resemblance to the moon. There are two other major factors that influence rings on a planetary basis: the planet’s axis of rotation, and its proximity to the node, which is a point in the orbit around a star system.
Planets close to the node are very hot, dense, and receive very little gravity. Because of this, they have large amounts of metals floating around, like water around a pool. These metals form rings as clumps, and their edges gradually grow wider until they fuse together. Many rings are made with a combination of these clumps of metal. A planet close to the node is considered to be a very stable orbit for a planet, and the formation of rings is often attributed to the formation of planets.
Some stars can be classified as being extremely stable and old planets. They do not rotate regularly, but they still spin off big parts of debris. This includes chunks of comet and asteroid debris. These debris pieces eventually become small enough to form planetary rings. Other celestial objects with stable and old orbits include comets, whose cores are made of metal-like materials. Many comets spin out rings as they ingest gas and lose angular momentum.
Other than gas giant planets, some relatively young solar system objects may also form rings. These objects include Pluto, i.e., the Kuiper belt, and / or Hale-Bopp, a comet discovered in Hale-Bopp’s orbit. These objects would not be candidates for formation of rings around Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, or any gas giant planets. The reason is that rings must be accreting from very young planets, with low gravity. Thus, objects such as comets, icy comets, and small icy planetoids could not accrete rings without further accreting material, such as ice.
Rings can also form around many of the inner moons of planets. These moons have a low gravity and are tidally dictated by their parent planet. If a moon moves away from its planet, it leaves a ring behind, sometimes called a “saddleback.” When this happens, a trail of this type of ring system can be seen around almost all the inner planets in our solar system. If a moon takes more than one satellite out of the system, it will leave a tail of rings around the planet.