The Shy Rings of The Ice Giant: You've Never Seen Uranus Like This!

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has shared a stunning image of the 'ice giant' Uranus in our Solar System. Webb's first look at Uranus highlights the planet's magnificent rings, bright moons, and dynamic atmosphere.

Uranus has 13 known rings, and 11 of them are visible in Webb's image; nine of these are classified as the planet's main rings, while the other two, like the fainter Zeta ring closest to the planet, were not discovered until the Voyager 2 flyby in 1986.

When Voyager 2 first imaged Uranus, the planet appeared featureless, resembling a motionless blue ball. The ring system was visible in Hubble images taken between November 2014 and November 2022, but not as clearly. What amazed astronomers in this image is the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) instrument on the space telescope, which is sensitive enough to capture the two innermost rings.
Each planet has its unique features, and Uranus is called an 'ice giant' due to its chemical composition. It is believed that the majority of its mass is composed of icy water, methane, and ammonia above a small rocky core. While not as massive as the gas giant Jupiter, storm clouds dominate its sky. Uranus has a larger diameter than Neptune but slightly smaller mass.
The interesting journey of this planet around the Sun takes 84 years. Uranus, the seventh planet from the Sun, rotates at an angle of about 90 degrees to its orbit, leading to extreme seasons.

If you look closely, on the right side of the planet, facing the Sun, there is a brightness known as a polar cap. This unique polar cap of Uranus will be facing Earth in 2028, providing Webb with the opportunity to observe this region in more detail. In addition to the cloud at the edge of the polar cap, a much brighter second cloud is seen on the left side, likely associated with storm activity.

Webb managed to capture six out of 27 known moons.

The new image from Webb, taken on February 6, 2023, from 1.5 million km away from Earth, resulted from a 12-minute exposure. While imaging Uranus, the space telescope managed to capture six out of the known 27 moons. It is believed that the inner moons are approximately half ice and half rock, but not much is known about the structure of the outer moons.
The brightest moons, including Puck, Ariel, Miranda, Umbriel, Titania, and Oberon, are visible, while others are too faint to be seen in the short 12-minute exposure.

A small side note: Uranus's moons are named after characters from Shakespeare and Alexander Pope's works, not from typical Greek or Roman literature.
NASA's $10 billion space telescope Webb is preparing to make more observations of the planet. Scientists are putting intense effort into a dedicated mission for the ice giant, aiming to uncover other rings that were discovered by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2007 but are currently hidden.