A team of astronomers at the University of Virginia have discovered a new ring orbiting Saturn, according to BBC News.
The ring is 13 million kilometers in radius and is the largest planetary ring in the Solar System. “It is extremely large. In terms of the volume of space it occupies, you could fit a billion earths inside of it,” said Anne Verbiscer, leader of the team, in a recorded interview with BBC.
Despite its size, the ring was difficult to detect because it is very tenuous, containing only about 20 tiny particles in one cubic kilometer of space. The ring is most likely composed of debris from Saturn’s moon Phoebe.