Uranus May Have Two More Tiny Shepherd Moons

Uranus may have two more (tiny) moons, researchers say, a potential discovery facilitated by the NASA Voyager 2 mission. According to the study, these two moons — assuming they exist — may be located close to Uranus's rings. Both the alpha and beta rings show patterns that hint at the existence of these moons, with the patterns themselves hinting that whatever is causing the pattern is a reoccurring event.

The potential discovery was made by University of Idaho doctoral student Rob Chancia, who looked over photos taken by Voyager 2 decades ago. Chancia spotted the ring change patterns in these photos — specifically, the amount of ring material on the alpha's edge seems to change periodically.

These pattern changes may be so-called "moonlet wakes," which have been observed with Saturn's rings and are known to result from moons. All signs point toward additional Uranus moons, but spotting them will be hard — its moons are dark colored, effectively camouflaging them. Because the data points toward the two potential moons being smaller, they may be especially hard to find it they're similarly dark colored.

These moonlets are possibly as small as 2-miles in diameter, and may be as large as 9-miles. However, researchers are yet to actually see the moonlets, and so there's no definite announcement that they actually exist at this point. However, the moons may serve an important purpose, being 'shepherd' moons that help maintain the rings. Uranus already has some shepherd moons, so adding two more to the mix wouldn't be surprising.

SOURCE: Phys.org