Uncover the mystery behind Saturn’s iconic rings. ExtremeTech explains their origins and the science of our solar system. Dive into the cosmos today!

If you were to pick Saturn out of a lineup you’d probably recognize it by its iconic rings. They’re the biggest, brightest rings in our solar system. Extending over 280,000 km from the planet ...

So it is with Saturn’s rings. For almost all of 2025, from March to November, the giant planet’s distinctive rings will disappear. The reason is simple. The rings, which range in thickness ...

Saturn has at least 146 moons, of which 63 are named—and thousands of moonlets are hiding inside its rings. Four of our planets have rings, but Saturn's are enormous and complex, in a class of ...

"Previous estimates of the age of Saturn's rings required a lot of modelling and were far more uncertain. But we now have direct measurements that allows us to constrain the age very well ...

If you were to pick Saturn out of a lineup you'd probably recognize it by its iconic rings. They're the biggest, brightest rings in our solar system. Extending over 280,000 km from the planet ...

Saturn's iconic rings are set to disappear from Earth's view in March 2025, an event that occurs roughly every 30 years. This phenomenon is a natural consequence of the planet's orbital position ...

In the animation, the line labeled "synchronous orbit" is synced up with the spin of Saturn itself, so it shows which parts of the rings you would see over time if you stood at that spot on the ...

While Saturn won't lose its rings, they will go edge-on, making them essentially invisible to observers on Earth. NASA's Amy Simon notes that the rings will only be faintly visible in the months ...

Saturn is famous for its extensive ring system, which was likely fed by the breakup of icy moons. A similar process may have occurred in orbit of Earth during the Ordovician. The team has ...

Subsequently, ground-based telescopes could only distinguish four unique concentric rings, labeled A, B, C, and D. Not until the 1980s did NASA's two Voyager probes fly by Saturn to photograph ...