title: New dust belts of Uranus: one ring, two ring, red ring, blue ring.
abstract: We compared near-infrared observations of the recently discovered outer rings of Uranus with Hubble Space Telescope results. We find that the inner ring, R/2003 U 2, is red, whereas the outer ring, R/2003 U 1, is very blue. Blue is an unusual color for rings; Saturn's enigmatic E ring is the only other known example. By analogy to the E ring, R/2003 U 1 is probably produced by impacts into the embedded moon Mab, which apparently orbits at a location where nongravitational perturbations favor the survival and spreading of submicron-sized dust. R/2003 U 2 more closely resembles Saturn's G ring, which is red, a typical color for dusty rings.
authors.affiliation: Astronomy Department, 601 Campbell Hall, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA. imke@astron.berkeley.edu
authors.forename: Imke
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: de Pater
authors.forename: Heidi B
authors.initials: HB
authors.lastname: Hammel
authors.forename: Seran G
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Gibbard
authors.forename: Mark R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Showalter
mesh_terms: D019443:Cosmic Dust; D007053:Ice; D018540:Uranus
chemical_list: D019443:Cosmic Dust; D007053:Ice