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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMysterious X-rays are flaring out of Uranus
For the first time, astronomers have detected mysterious X-rays flaring out of Uranus. According to NASA scientists, Uranus is so massive that it could just be scattering X-rays given off by the sun more than a billion miles away. Or, perhaps the fine rings of dust surrounding Uranus are generating their own radiation through some unknown process. A closer study of Uranus is required to know for sure.
Uranus is cold, windy and made almost entirely of ice and gas. Even though it's enormous (with a diameter about four times Earth's), Uranus is difficult to study in depth. Only one spacecraft NASA's Voyager 2 has ever made the perilous journey to the planet, forcing scientists to rely mostly on telescope observations much closer to Earth in order to study the ice giant.
According to NASA, X-rays are emitted when matter is heated to millions of degrees, like when stars explode or when matter swirls around the edge of a black hole at near light speed. Until recently, X-ray emissions had been detected from every planet in the solar system except Uranus and Neptune. In the new study, researchers looked at Chandra data taken from Uranus in 2002 and 2017, and saw clear evidence of X-ray emissions in both years.
Several of these emissions had a brightness consistent with solar X-rays being scattered back outward, the researchers wrote. However, in the 2017 observations, the team detected a possible "flare" of X-rays, where the brightness of emissions around Uranus increased four times from one day to the next.
https://www.livescience.com/uranus-x-ray-radiation-detected.html

gratuitous
(82,849 posts)I had asparagus for dinner last night.
TexasTowelie
(126,259 posts)ETA: A closer study isn't going to happen.
lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)TexasTowelie
(126,259 posts)Ocelot II
(129,730 posts)lpbk2713
(43,255 posts)Stay away from habanero chili peppers.
FSogol
(47,543 posts)
/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/250?cb=20160804092747Jerry2144
(3,214 posts)Tac OBell
sarisataka
(22,356 posts)It's kinda personal
MissMillie
(39,590 posts).
Yavin4
(37,182 posts)NewDayOranges
(751 posts)Picks up phone and types: No they're not!!!
lindysalsagal
(22,840 posts)sarcasmo
(23,968 posts)2naSalit
(100,976 posts)Just wait till I get outside!
11 Bravo
(24,292 posts)MiniMe
(21,879 posts)left-of-center2012
(34,195 posts)I used the title of the linked article
MiniMe
(21,879 posts)No offense, but I really don't want to hear anything about Uranus
lunatica
(53,410 posts)Stop giggling!
FlyingPiggy
(3,748 posts)jcgoldie
(12,046 posts)Clicked in here to make a joke only to find out the first 20 or so responders have just as juvenile sense of humor as I.
denbot
(9,948 posts)There is a reason its the funniest planet in the universe..
