Uranian Ring System

  • Astronomers Snap Thermal Images of Uranian Ring System
    Astronomers Snap Thermal Images of Uranian Ring System0

    The rings of the ice giant Uranus are invisible to all but the largest telescopes — they weren’t even discovered until 1977. However, they are surprisingly bright in the new thermal images taken by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT). The new images allowed astronomers for the first time to measure the temperature of rings particles: minus 321 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 196 degrees Celsius).