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The team derived the age of Selam, a "moonlet" circling the small asteroid Dinkinesh in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, based only on dynamics, or how the pair moves in space.

These particles can't reform a moonlet if they are close to the planet and within the Roche limit, because tidal forces from the parent body constantly rip them apart and prevent them from clumping, according to the researchers.

"We've got to find some way of stopping that moonlet forming that far out," Dhillon said.

"The particles in the ring are colliding all the time, and if these collisions are elastic, it means the particles can't stick together to form a moonlet."

That means that the impact significantly changed the moonlet's orbital velocity.