New Research Suggests a Heavy Object May Have Warped Solar System's Orbits
A study by physicists from the University of Toronto and the University of Arizona has proposed a hypothesis that a massive object may have influenced the orbits of planets in our Solar System. The research indicates that an object between 2 to 50 times the mass of Jupiter could have passed through the Solar System during its formation, creating the slightly tilted and elliptical orbits observed today.
The researchers, Garett Brown, Hanno Rein, and Renu Malhotra, conducted simulations based on potential interactions with nearby stars and found that a mass just over eight times that of Jupiter, moving at approximately 2.69 kilometers per second, would best match the current planetary arrangement. They noted that such an event could lead to an inner planet being ejected from the Solar System in a small percentage of cases.
Although the probability of such an encounter is low, ranging from 1 in 1,000 to 1 in 10,000, the study suggests that the Milky Way is rich with suitable star clusters that could provide opportunities for similar celestial events in the future. The findings are currently available on the preprint server arXiv and await peer review.
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