In 1977, Voyager 1 discovered a startling but faint ring of particles surrounding Jupiter. I was five years old. As soon as I found out about this, I told my teacher at school. She didn't believe me, no one did.

Jupiter's rings were totally unexpected. Two of the Voyager 1 scientists insisted that after traveling 1 billion km it was at least worth a quick look to see if any rings might be present. Everyone else thought that the chance of finding anything was nil, but there they were. It was a major coup.

Everyone knows Saturn has rings. For years I would insist that Jupiter had rings too, and people would look at me askance. People believe what they want to.

Unlike Saturn's, Jupiter's rings are dark. They're probably composed of very small grains of rocky material, particles range from dust to boulders to house sized. Unlike Saturn's rings, they seem to contain no ice.

In 1996, The Galileo Orbiter imaged the ring system of Jupiter, showing a radial structure that had only been hinted at in the low brightness level of the single Voyager image.

Jupiter's outermost ring is actually two rings, one embedded within the other: a flat main ring, and the gossamer ring, which lies exterior to the main ring. The gossamer ring is an extremely diffuse and uniform band. Particles don't stay in there for long.

Atmospheric and magnetic drag continuously resupplies the rings with dust formed by micro-meteor impacts on the four inner moons. Thus, the inner halo ring is ever broadened by interactions with Jupiter's magnetic field.