DYNAMICS AND COMPOSITION OF RINGS

Abstract. Planetary rings are found around all four giant planets of our solar system. These colli-sional and highly flattened disks exhibit a whole wealth of physical processes involving dust grains up to meter-sized boulders. These processes, together with ring composition, can help understand better the formation and evolution of proto-satellite and proto-planetary disks in the early solar sys-tem. The present chapter reviews some fundamental aspects of ring dynamics and composition. The forthcoming exploration of the Saturn system by the Cassini mission will bring both high resolution and time-dependent information on Saturn’s rings