Saturn's Rings May Be As Old As Solar System

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An artists concept of a close-up view of Saturns ring particles. The blue particles are composed mostly of ice and clump together to form elongated curved aggregates continually forming and dispersing. The space between the clumps is mostly empty. Th ...
An artist's concept of a close-up view of Saturn's ring particles. The blue particles are composed mostly of ice and clump together to form elongated, curved aggregates, continually forming and dispersing. The space between the clumps is mostly empty. The largest individual particles shown are a few yards across. Credit: Image courtesy NASA/JPL/University of Colorado

New observations by NASA's Cassini spacecraft indicate the rings of Saturn, once thought to have formed during the age of the dinosaurs, instead may have been created roughly 4.5 billion years ago when the solar system was still under construction.


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All News summaries for December 13, 2007