Source : NASA
Uranus is that the 7th planet from the Sun and is also referred to as the “sideways planet” because it rotates on its side. it’s an Ice Giant planet and nearly 4X larger than Earth. it’s two sets of rings around its equator.
Uranus is formed of water, methane, and ammonia fluids above alittle rocky center. Its atmosphere is formed of hydrogen and helium like Jupiter and Saturn, but it also has methane.
Recently, by using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers- for the 1st time-have detected X-rays from Uranus. This discovery may need implications in knowing more about Uranus.
Astronomers used Chandra observations taken in Uranus in 2002 then again in 2017. They saw a crystal clear detection of X-rays from the 1st observation, just analyzed recently, and a possible flare of X-rays in those obtained 15 years later.
What causes Uranus to emit X-rays?
The answer is Sun. Scientists observed scattering x-ray light from both Jupiter and Saturn. This x-ray light was given by Sun, just like the same way Earth’s atmosphere scatters the Sun’s light.
While authors this that the majority of the X-rays detected would even be from scattering, but there are possibilities that there’s a minimum of one other source of X-rays is present.
One possibility is that Uranus’ rings are generating these x-rays. As highly energetic particles surround Uranus, the collision of those particles with rings may have caused the rings to glow in X-rays.
Another possibility includes that the aurora of the uranus may need generated at-least of a number of the X-rays.
The findigs were reported on Journal Of Geophysical Research.
