Saturn moon may have its own ring, in a lunar first

0 Comments | AFP, March, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Saturn's second largest moon Rhea could have at least one ring, the first to be discovered around a planet's satellite, researchers reported in Friday's edition of the journal Science.

A broad debris disk and at least one ring appear to have been detected around Rhea by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, a US-European probe launched in 1997 to explore Saturn, a statement from the US space agency said.

"Until now, only planets were known to have rings, but now Rhea seems to have some family ties to its ringed parent Saturn," said lead researcher Geraint Jones of the Mullard Space Science Laboratory at University College in London, formerly at the Max Planck Institute in Germany.

The discovery was the result of Cassini's close flyby of Rhea in...