As expected, this catastrophe on the orbit of Uranus
American astronomers have revealed that Cressida and Desdemona, two satellites of Uranus, will face each other. The Preprint studies available on the website arXiv.org and accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal, reports New Scientist.
A collision of moons must happen in a million years. At present their orbits are separated from each other by only 900 miles.
To such conclusions the authors came, considering the mass and density (about 0.86 grams per cubic centimeter) of Cressida, as well as modeling its movement over millions of years. Scientists believe that in the past, Cressida and Desdemona could collide with each other or other celestial bodies, as indicated by two diffuse dust clouds, are close companions.
The moon opened in January 1986, images from Voyager 2 of the station. The satellites are irregular in shape in cross-section do not exceed 90 km.
For the first time about the possibility of a collision of Cressida and Desdemona became known in 1997, conducted when the evaluation indicates that the catastrophe will happen through 4-100 million years. Also face needs, for example, Cupid and Belinda, two additional satellites of Uranus. Experts believe that the ring system of planets were formed in the result of multiple collisions and its various moons.