The rings of Saturn are surprisingly young

Scientists have long being trying to determine just how old the rings of Saturn are — did they form at the same time as the planet, 4.5 billion years ago, or are they younger, the result of a moon or comet being pulverized by Saturn's gravitational pull?

NASA's Cassini probe provided the answer. Before it dove into Saturn's atmosphere in 2017, ending its exploration of the planet, Cassini sent back its final pieces of data. The satellite flew between the rings multiple times, and found their mass is 20 times smaller than previous estimates, only about two-fifths the mass of Saturn's moon Mimas. With that information, as well as knowing the proportion of dust in the rings and the rate that dust is added, scientists were able to determine that Saturn's rings could be as young as 10 million years old but no more than 100 million years old.

Looking at the big picture that is the Solar System, this is considered "yesterday," Luciano Iess of Sapienza University in Rome told BBC News. Last month, a group of scientists determined that every 30 minutes, enough ring particles are falling onto Saturn to fill an Olympic-sized pool. Dr. Tom Stallard of Leicester University in the United Kingdom told BBC News the rings will likely disappear in "at most 100 million years," and 50 to 100 million years ago, the rings would have been "even bigger and even brighter" than they are today.

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