Quaoar is a dwarf planet, a very strange dwarf planet, so strange that it has tested the Roche limit, and this casts doubt on scientists.
The ESA (European Space Agency) announced the discovery of a dwarf planet, located far beyond Neptune, in the Kuiper belt, it has rings, rings that in theory should not exist. The number of ringed planets in the solar system in 2013 was four, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, until that same year Centauro Clarico was discovered and in 2017 the dwarf planet Haumea was discovered, these discoveries left in Of course there could be rings in smaller bodies.
However, even if these bodies were smaller, they did not break the Roche limit, so everything was normal up to that point. But Quaoar forced astronomers to completely rethink current theory.
Quaoar is half the size of Pluto and is located at a distance of 43 astronomical units, that is, 43 times the distance between Earth and the Sun, and the ring that surrounds it has a radius of 4,100 km, which is equivalent to 7 times the radius of the planet itself. According to Eduard Roche’s limit, there is a maximum and minimum distance for the formation of rings and that after a certain distance the forces known as tidal forces would prevent the particles that orbit around them from uniting to form satellites. On the contrary, beyond this distance there would be no problem with those same particles grouping together and creating satellites that orbit around them.
In simple words, this ring made of debris that is outside the limit should end up being a Moon, within 10 to 20 years according to ESA scientists, for now the only explanation that scientists have been able to give is that , this strange ring is there due to Weywot, a small natural satellite that created gravitational disturbances, thus preventing the ring particles from merging, and being suspended in this peculiar way.
Perhaps, and only perhaps, the secrets held by this ring and some other trans-Neptunian objects hold the first step in planet formation, or the Roche limit may need to be rethought, for now scientists are intrigued and eager to know more. about this dwarf planet and its strange ring.
And did you know about the existence of Quaoar and his strange ring?
