Why Does Earth NOT Have Rings? The Roche Limit Explained

[@markmuir7338]

This explanation of tidal forces and the Roche limit really rings with me.

[@ScienceAsylum]

😆

[@sirmongrel511]

It wasn't too big a stretch to follow along.

[@Anklejbiter]

these puns are really starting to fall apart

[@crimzenwoffinden9973]

​@@ScienceAsylumhey I got a question, if space is expanding then what's it expanding into; what is on the outside of space. If it's nothing but space then shouldn't there be an always has been situation on the size of space? Maybe the expansion is just because matter and things hasn't always been around?

[@playgroundchooser]

Woa.... I'm only 41 years old and we didn't know that Neptune had rings when I was born!! 😲 It's easy to forget that science is STILL happening!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Right?! So many things we take for granted now in science are much more recent discoveries than we imagine.

[@RPCauldron]

40 yo here and that was my same exact reaction 😂

[@diegofernandez4789]

We were missing you Nick. Please keep uploading great videos as this one.

[@ScienceAsylum]

We've come up with a plan for the second half of the year that should allow for more videos than usual.

[@iamjimgroth]

​@@ScienceAsylum Quality before quantity. That's what I'd prefer anyway. 😅

[@ChinnuWoW]

@@iamjimgroth They always are and will be of great quality.

[@ScienceAsylum]

@@iamjimgroth Don't worry. I'm not saying I'm going to start putting out crap or anything. It's just that not all topics _require_ the same amount of effort or time. I'm trying to be better at knowing when to stop "perfecting" a video (because, at some point, there are diminishing returns and I'm wasting time/effort).

[@iamjimgroth]

@@ScienceAsylum it can even be negative returns if you don't know when to stop. Btw, that rock on the surface analogy was awesome. I've always had a hard time explaining tidal forces, but now I think I can. 😁

[@A3Kr0n]

We have rings of techno rocks orbiting the Earth.

[@blackmewtwo3569]

The satellites?

[@nugboy420]

Lol techno rocks. Boom boom boom chicka chicka

[@Broockle]

@@blackmewtwo3569 The moon is a satellite 🤓

[@lemagicbaguette1917]

@@Broockle did satellite first describe natural bodies or orbiting spacecraft? Serious question, btw

[@Broockle]

@@lemagicbaguette1917 Just anything in Orbit. A falling rock is a satellite until it hits the floor 😆

[@msachin4885]

I'd be cool if you made a video on Saturn's moons. The closer you stare, the more physics you find behind the cosmic beauty

[@KnowBuddiesLP]

I come for the science! I stay for the humor! Actually chuckled when voyager flew by and the "wheeeeeee!". Keep it up and look forward to another 10 years!

[@Mysoi123]

That beginning Big Bang joke never gets old! 😂

[@ScienceAsylum]

😂

[@MultiDudeman]

Love the majors mask reference! 😄 great video 👍

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks!

[@feynstein1004]

The molecular forces part blew my mind. I was about to ask just that. Thank you for giving us the complete picture, Nick 😊

[@ScienceAsylum]

Yeah, I was reading about it and was, like, "Wait, what?! Weird."

[@feynstein1004]

@@ScienceAsylum Btw I just realized. Tidal forces can also be thought of as a tug of war between the gravity of the planet and the gravity of the satellite. Wait, I'm pretty sure you said something similar in your video on Lagrange points. An object halfway (gravitationally) between the moon and the earth would be equally pulled in both directions and thus remain motionless. It's the same pattern. Except that the object is well, the part of the moon closest to the planet. It's being pulled in two opposite directions: upward toward the planet and downward toward the moon. I was wondering about this apparent contradiction regarding how gravity can tear things apart when it's only attractive. Turns out, when you have different centers of gravity (pun intended), you can get ripped apart if you get caught in the middle. This also explains why once the moon disintegrates into rings, it becomes stable. The orbiting particles no longer have self-gravity and thus there is nothing to oppose the gravitational pull of the planet. Hmm but wait. If self-gravity is the cause of tidal force, then how can people get spaghettified near black holes? People aren't held together by their own gravity 🤔

[@odysseus9672]

Fantastic video. I had only ever heard of the rigid Roche limit before, so it was really interesting to hear about the elastic limit.

[@KeithCooper-Albuquerque]

Excellent video!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks!

[@rythenx]

I missed this video when it got uploaded but just heard you mention it in your recent video about KZbin changes so I went back to watch it and I agree, this video is great. I hope you will be able to stay motivated (both financially and personally) to keep making videos like this one, especially cause you said you enjoyed making this one in particular.

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks for the confirmation 🤓

[@n4whhdb]

I'm watching this for the second time. Love the use of the timeline. Great content!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Glad you enjoyed it! 🤓

[@LTMarhman]

Your vids are wicked awesome! 😅

[@ScienceAsylum]

😆 Thanks!

[@anoimo9013]

Amazing video. 6:20 deformation also affects selfgravty forces seen form the surface

[@ScienceAsylum]

Good point.

[@williamschrom1584]

Appreciate the humor... keep it up

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks!

[@iammrbeat]

This video rings so true. Maybe if Mars finally proposed to Earth it'd finally have a ring.

[@ScienceAsylum]

😂

[@artificercreator]

The roche limit! It sounds cool!

[@tobiasengel8385]

You sir are amazing, kid-friendly, immersive content, and highly educational. Thank you! I'm now subscribed

[@ScienceAsylum]

I'm glad you found the channel! Welcome 🤓

[@paradox7358]

Can you imagine the night sky with rings? Not like I could see it anyway with all the light pollution. I'm lucky if I see a star!

[@ScienceAsylum]

If you can see the Moon, then you could see the rings. During the day, even!

[@whoeveriam0iam14222]

can you imagine space travel with bands of debris around the equator

[@davidvavra9113]

I live under the clouds west of Seattle, the stars are a myth

[@ScienceAsylum]

@@davidvavra9113 😆

[@KevinCombs1980]

Always a highlight of the day when there's a new science asylum video! Thank you for what you do sir!

[@peterp-a-n4743]

super interesting! great explanations!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Glad you liked it 🤓

[@harthur2010]

Great video. I didn’t know before that Saturn’s rings will disappear one day. Love the videos with the time line. Also quite liked the voyager sound effect 😊

[@Yezpahr]

3:14 LOL... It took me about 10 seconds before I understood all the layers of that statement.

[@maxisalamone]

I love this channel, keep up the good work Nick!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks! Will do! 🤓

I love Your channel, mate!

[@scottperry9581]

An electron is speeding down the highway and gets stopped by a traffic cop. "Do you know how fast you were going?" asked the cop. "I have no idea." replied the electron. "You were going 98 miles per hour." said the cop. "Great! Now I am lost!" complained the elctron.

[@AloisMahdal]

The 10:00 length of this video made me feel nostalgia

[@ScienceAsylum]

I didn't do it on purpose. It just kind of... happened.

[@Poor.and.Bruised.of.Spirit]

Your channel is reminiscent of me watching Bill Nye The Science Guy as a youth. Though I appreciate your videos much more. Thank you for taking complex subjects and making them understandable for us simpletons.

[@rayoflight62]

Very good explanation of planetary rings, satellites, and the working of the Roche limit. The details of Saturn Ring gatekeepers is an important detail added to the lecture. Thanks, Anthony

[@_folinks]

Loved the majora's mask reference there, keep up the good work

[@guyxmas7519]

Such awesomeness in this video!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks! 🤓

[@RikR1958]

as always, brilliant educational video!

[@MidnighterClub]

Cool explanation of Roche limit!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Glad you liked it! 🤓

[@Benson_aka_devils_advocate_88]

Makes you wonder if our moon had a major impact that makes a temporary ring structure, which in turn would block a ton of sunlight, plunging us into an ice age...

[@cyrilio]

This might explain the ‘great dying’. Besides a gamma ray burst I don’t think there are any good hypotheses for the cause.

[@Benson_aka_devils_advocate_88]

@@cyrilio I would think there may be traces of it in the geologic record. But has anyone taken a look? That's what popped into my mind.

[@xx_redwood_xx9737]

Lunar rings wouldn't block out the Sun any more than the Moon already does (barring eclipses), unless they were absurdly huge.

[@gabrielgoldwoulfe2277]

Majora's Mask lol Creepy AF got me! Also Enceladus feeds Saturns rings with water/ice eruptions constantly.

[@nokian9005]

I have a theory. I think KZbin knows you're one of my favorite creators. That's why it usually waits a day or two to show me your videos when they get posted, because the algorithm is trying to check to see how quickly I find out about your video on my own before recommending it to me. KZbin uses people like me as guinea pigs to gauge what to do with the metric count. But anyways, all theories aside- this is a good upload! I've always been fascinated by rings. I remember being a kid and swearing that I saw a planet with rings in the sky when stargazing once. As an adult I can't make out the rings anymore, but at least I can recognize Saturn and Jupiter sometimes. ☺️

[@petersage5157]

Nick: "I'm going to exaggerate sizes...which is something I've never, ever done before." Emily: ...

[@ScienceAsylum]

😂

[@CT-pi2gl]

I think it's cool how you use the comic sans or similarly loose font for the mathematical expressions. It makes it more approachable, and like someone just scrawled it down in the middle of doing an experiment.

[@ScienceAsylum]

I _really_ like the math font I use, but it drives some people crazy. Apparently, people have different preferences. Who knew? 😉

[@fozzsr]

Particularly good yuks this round buddy, nice. 😁👍

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks 👍

[@pixelpatter01]

The downside of rings around Earth would be the reflected light providing extra heating on some portions of the globe and shadows on other portions. It would sure complicate our seasons or at least accentuate them. I'd love to hear you discuss that situation.

[@qevvy]

While I'm not a big fan of geoengineering solutions to global warming, I'd totally get behind an artificial Earth ring system as a sun shade just for the spectacle of the thing. 😄

[@suranjanroy7528]

Loved it.

[@Eoraph]

so basically, the moon gets spaghettified and this is the same process that makes accretion disks out of stars around black Holes.

[@ScienceAsylum]

Yep. The black hole version is just more extreme.

[@LendriMujina]

I like the story about how Galileo tried to communicate his discovery of Saturn's rings to Kepler through a coded message, only for Kepler to get it wrong and mistakenly read it as his discovering Mars having two moons.

[@LuneLovehearn]

Hey Nick. What if you consider a system where a planet like earth has rings but has moons that keep it in check like Saturn. That would be a cool follow up video topic. Also the rings could be pale compared to Saturn unless the rings are formed from a material similar to the moon soil.

[@Broockle]

I think a better question to address this curiosity would be; what if Saturn and all it's orbital objects (moons and rings) were scaled down to earth's size. Would the orbits still function the same? I would think the rings would be much shorter lived in that case.

[@kingmasterlord]

so we start capturing near-earth asteroids, mine the metals out, and put the rest in the LaGrange points and _make_ some

[@arbodox]

As usual, awesome video with your clear explanations! What do you think is going on with Quaoar's recently-discovered rings, which orbit outside of its Roche limit?

[@ScienceAsylum]

There could be several reasons. Most of Saturn's rings are outside their Roche limit, but Saturn has those Shepherd moons to help keep things in place. Also, collisions can cause rings. It doesn't have be tidal disruption (like with Phobos). So it's possible a couple large rocks collided near Quaoar and we just happened to catch the rings while they're still there.

[@TheOblomoff]

I only knew planetary rings existed, not their nature. Turns out the explanation is surprisingly simple. And yes, it would be; the distances aren't cosmology-big. :)

[@Chad_Thundercock]

They say if you cut a planet in half and count the rings, you can tell how old it is.

[@ScienceAsylum]

😂

[@on1yadam]

😂😂😂😂😂

[@agargamer6759]

Nice video, I didn't know that Galileo had such a crude picture of the rings with his telescope

[@ScienceAsylum]

Yep! I felt like that was an important historical detail. By giving all the credit to Galileo, we miss out on how knowledge is gained _incrementally._

[@dblaze23]

5:19 why does that rock starts revolving around planet instead of falling straight (directly) into it

[@nerobernardino88]

Because it was already revolving around the planet, the moon is already revolving around the planet.

[@ScienceAsylum]

Technically, it takes 10s of millions of years. Think of it like a time lapse: one picture every time the moon gets back to that spot in its orbit.

[@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC]

Very entertaining video - as usual. ... You're dancing _rings_ around the other channels!

[@underwatermoon]

Great Video! Just wanted to add that rings don’t necessarily have to form from mass being within the Roche limit. Take the E-ring of Saturn for example. This ring is made by a moon of Saturn, Enceladus, spewing large amounts of water from its geysers on the south pole into space. This creates a ring only visible when backlit by the sun, it is however still a ring, and a pretty big one at that! Quaoar, the briefly mentioned dwarf planet, has it’s rings well outside of it’s Roche limit, meaning the cause of the rings cant be explained with the Roche limit. The formation of the rings are still being disputed!

[@ScienceAsylum]

Yeah, I actually put a list on the screen at 2:07

[@underwatermoon]

@@ScienceAsylum oh, sorry. It seems like i missed that…

[@ScienceAsylum]

@@underwatermoon Understandable. It was a very brief side note. Easy to miss.

[@ZohaibKhan-mr7uy]

Please do a video on the spin of particles why fermions have 1/2h spin and boson have 0 or 1,2h etc. Your explanation is phenomenal. Thanks

[@josmeproslonije724]

Liked the video just cause of the Majora's Mask reference! 10/10

[@AlexandarHullRichter]

I think people picture moons as being solid chunks of rock that you could throw at something and have them not break apart, like a small piece of granite. It's much more realistic to see moons as collections of small rocks and dirt that are only held together in the first place by self-gravity. After all, that's what the surface of the Earth is in most places. There's nothing keeping dirt, sand, hills, mountains, oceans, etc. on the ground, except that they're heavy and the Earth has self-gravity.

[@alexvilonyay8597]

Great video as always! I'm curious if that limit would exist for a star? Crazy for life!

[@KohuGaly]

Yes, it is even mentioned in the video when he mentions the comet.

[@alhypo]

Someday soon we might have artificial rings around Earth... once a few satellites collide and their debris start a chain reaction. 😨

[@JanStrojil]

Coming back to rewatch, like and comment. Let’s boost the algorithm.

[@viralsheddingzombie5324]

Never walk up to a stranger and say: "I love the rings around Uranus."

[@danielbickford3458]

I actually had that happen in Middle School. One of my classmates asked my teacher why is Uranus so big? Why Uranus have rings around it? Why is Uranus blue? You can guess exactly how he pronounced that. My teacher was less than amused. If I recall correctly she sent him to the principal's office

[@fep_ptcp883]

But Uranus needs to be more explored and studied

[@sol_mental]

So. Cool. This is awesome and I do want to one day visit Saturn's rings

[@UtraVioletDreams]

0:19 Well if we continue to dump lots of debris in space, we will get our ring eventually.

[@jamesdriscoll_tmp1515]

A Hill sphere talk would be a cool topic, maybe part of a basic orbital mechanics series. Do you play KSP?

[@ScienceAsylum]

I considered making Hill spheres a side note in this video, but decided it should be its own video. (No, I've never used KSP.)

[@OrdenJust]

Excellent pronunciation of "Huygens"! I've been saying it wrong lo these many years.

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks! Someone corrected me on it years ago and I've said it this way ever since.

[@JohnDoe-lt4kl]

It's OK to exaggerate sizes for clarity, as long as this does not come across as a stretch. And, by the way, Earth used to have rings (and hobbits)...

[@ScienceAsylum]

Keep it secret, keep it safe.

[@jamesdriscoll_tmp1515]

Orbital resonance is another cool phenomena.

[@ScienceAsylum]

True! But I don't think any video I make about it would be better than Steve Mould's video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/h6rRZ2eYabGBgJI

[@ricojes]

How it started: trying to turn space junk into earth's rings How it's going: Kessler syndrome

[@GMPranav]

It feels like rings would be more interesting, but honestly if we got used to seeing rings, we would complain we dont have a moon while pther planets do.

[@KohuGaly]

One interesting fact about rings is that if earth had them, it would be plainly obvious by the naked eye that earth is a sphere. You could literally see its round shadow on the rings at night.

[@Casa-de-hongos]

Only found out about this video, because of the rant in the other one. Even though I watched all your videos for years, youtube really thought this one won't be my taste.

[@ScienceAsylum]

The algorithm doesn't always make the best choices... at least not what's best for either of us anyway.

[@BrycetheyoungAstronomer]

I agreed with you I love Saturn too. Saturn is not only planet in the solar system has rings, but Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune does has rings too. I do love space a lot. It part of my dream come true. I also love Jupiter also. Jupiter is the king of planets.

[@Bassotronics]

I thought the Earth had no rings because it is like me, never married.

[@alexcunhapinto]

I just can't stop loving you.

[@stevengeorges9046]

Can you imagine how hard it would be to have stable orbiting satellites if we had rings around earth?

[@ScienceAsylum]

Ok, so maybe there would be practical problems.

[@paulozhang1340]

The crazy guy on the left side is more genuine to me 😂

[@laz7354]

👍 for the Majora's Mask reference! 🌚

[@Castellano365]

Is that one of Nicole's @SoundoftheForest "It's a fancy bag" shirts?👀

[@ScienceAsylum]

Yep! That's exactly what it is 🙂

[@billyyank2198]

The story of how the rings of Uranus were discovered is quite fascinating.

[@ScienceAsylum]

😆

[@misterlau5246]

Doctor Lucid! Long time no see! Before I watch your video.. No rings here, just you wait till we get enough basura espacial allá arriba

[@ScienceAsylum]

I took a little vacation after my live stream last month. Should be back in action now though.

[@Lucky-df8uz]

This video was brilliant, pun intended.

[@ScienceAsylum]

😂

[@mrdraw2087]

What makes the rings decay? The collisions between the particles?

[@ScienceAsylum]

A planetary ring is a "many-body problem." Those are notoriously unstable because everything is tugging on everything else.

[@bobthetrashcollector]

I feel like Cody's lab is playing in the next room the entire time

[@Ryan-lk4pu]

Ever since I was a child I have dreamt of sitting on a planet that has rings, or better still, the moon of a gas giant that had rings. Imagine those views looking up...

[@Ryan-lk4pu]

It's why I play a lot of space games.

[@ScienceAsylum]

Yeah, living on the moon of a gas giant with rings would be so cool!!

[@Muladeseis]

This made me remember one of your videos called "One Side of the Moon ALWAYS Faces Us. Why is that? | Tidal Locking". I made there a question, if that tidal locking has any relationship with the Moon moving away from the Earth? I hope you could help me answering that, thank you!

[@KohuGaly]

Yes it does. The process of tidal locking transfers energy from rotation of the body to the orbital energy. Basically, the tides caused by the moon deform the shape of the earth. As the earth rotates, the deformations "drag" the moon gravitationally. This causes the moon to gain orbital angular momentum and earth loose rotational angular momentum. For moon, this process is already finished (it's tidally locked). For earth the process is still happening.

[@jamesmnguyen]

And since the Earth spins faster than the Moon's orbit, energy is transferred to the Moon causing its orbit to increase in energy (go higher in orbit). Eventually the Moon and the Earth will rotate at the same rate (freezing the moon in the sky). Although this will take longer than the age of our Sun so don't get excited.

[@Muladeseis]

@@KohuGaly wow, very interesting, thanks for your answer! And I hope that we have ever a video on that topic here in the channel.

[@horizonbrave1533]

LOl I never exaggerate size for clarity... haha, the stuff you slide in to these talks is scandalous nick! 😂😂

[@ScienceAsylum]

😂

[@Douglas_Blake_579]

Where are Earth's rings? We're building them now with all the stuff we've put into low Earch Orbit.

[@restaurantlafamilia]

2:39 that planet was called Theia when that happened

[@KekusMagnus]

given how old planets are and how short-lived rings are, it's not easy to imagine Jupiter at some point in time having massive rings, much bigger than Jupiter. Now that would be cool

[@Dodoskee]

Great explanation as usual! ❤

[@ScienceAsylum]

Thanks!

[@Quadr44t]

2:40 How confident are we that this actually happened? It is a compelling story, especially when think about their respective compositions… But still…

[@ScienceAsylum]

It's the explanation that makes the most sense within our models. The idea has been around for a while and has held up to the relentless scrutiny that science provides. I'd say pretty dang confident.

[@XtReMz98]

Earth knows how valuable she is. She's waiting for the perfect gentleman that will put a ring on her.

[@ScienceAsylum]

😆

[@jeremycraft8452]

3:17 Nick challenges M for the title of Awkward.

[@kiedto]

Roche limit gives me the sensation it's a bit like the event horizon of black holes. Any object passing that limit will start spaghettification and will just snap.

[@cortster12]

The event horizon of a black hole isn't like a roche limit, since spaghettification happens well before the event horizon of a black hole.

[@caterscarrots3407]

@@cortster12 Yeah, if you're comparing the Roche limit to black holes, then it's more analogous to the ISCO(Innermost Stable Circular Orbit) of a black hole, right? And that's far out from the event horizon(which is more analogous to the planet surface)

[@kevingalls]

Loved this and it’s a good explanation, but didn’t get into what happens if the body passes quickly through the Roche limit such as an asteroid with an orbital trajectory intercepting Earth. In this scenario it may not break up, and even if it slightly disintegrated, all of the mass would still smash into Earth. As another example, let’s say a huge asteroid collided with the moon with enough force and the perfect angle so as to stop the moon from orbiting Earth. So if the moon was stationary with respect to Earth and started falling into the gravity well of Earth, would it break up? I mean, it wouldn’t matter because we’d still die but I do wonder… 🤔

[@n4whhdb]

Exaggerating sizes for clarity sometimes leads to scale envy. 😅

[@GlenHunt]

Did I click like before watching, or did I watch it backwards and then click like? Which way did t go?? Also, "to the timeline!!"

[@deeprecce9852]

We are creating so much space debris, who knows we may hv a visible ring someday!

[@ComradePhoenix]

I mean, technically speaking, Earth has rings: our geostationary satellites, and the geosynchronus ones.

[@Mu51kM4n]

Wait so is it possible that the earth did have some rings at some point but they already disappeared? You said that if earth had rings they would have already disappeared by now. Certainly the collision sent enough material far enough away to create our moon, but what are the chances that some of that material stayed close enough to create rings as well, even if they were small? Is there any evidence that could be possible?

[@ScienceAsylum]

*"Wait so is it possible that the earth did have some rings at some point but they already disappeared?"* Yes, that's absolutely possible. I don't think there's any way to know though (without time travel).

[@victorcapel2755]

Earth is the best planet, by far, and should of course have rings.

[@ScienceAsylum]

I agree that it's the best planet, but I think we're both biased 😉

[@KyanoAng3l0_Mtvtks]

Came back to this video after reading about a recent (2024) study suggesting that Earth may have had a ring back in the Ordovician, when an asteroid got close enough to Earth to break apart and turn into one. This ring system may have lasted for almost 40M years before crashing down, which could've been the Ordovician impact spike. The meteorites being once a ring could explain the unique distribution of the craters in the equator. The shading by the ring could've also caused the early Paleozoic ice age. No definitive proof yet, but an interesting theory nonetheless.

[@Vioxtar]

Does this mean that the gigantic orbital space stations we see orbiting planets in movies should actually be breaking apart due to tidal forces?