We can all thank Jupiter for Earth

A new theory is being proposed to explain how our solar system is different than most in our galaxy.

Most other systems that have planets orbiting around a star similar to our sun look very different. They generally have at least one planet significantly larger than Earth that's in a closer orbit than Mercury's. But they don't have many objects farther out.

"The Grand Tack scenario" basically says that most solar systems have "super earths" close their sun. However, early in our solar systems existence, Jupiter might have been pulled closer to the sun due to its mass and may have swallowed up one or more of these "super earths" or even threw them into the sun.

The two scientists who proposed the theory, Konstantin Batygin(Caltech)and Gregory Laughlin(University of California, Santa Cruz), go on to say

that during its inward journey, Jupiter dragged a load of planetary building blocks, known as planetesimals, along with it. That sent the planetesimals smashing into debris in the inner solar system, causing them to break apart and fall into the sun at a faster rate.

They also added that Saturn's gravity prevented Jupiter from smashing into the sun and pulled it further away from the sun.

On its way back out, Jupiter left some remaining planetesimals in its wake -- the building blocks that over millions of years would come to form Earth, Mercury, Venus and Mars.

Interesting theory, I wonder if this could account for the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter as well.
LINK

a reply to: kevinp2300

How in the hell could someone even speculate that something was "thrown" into the sun billions of years ago? Maybe it's me, but most people in the scientific community will even believe this crap shoveled at them....There is absolutely zero proof that things like this even in the slightest bit "might" have happened....But I guess everyone needs to listen to the scientists, they know what went on oh so long ago...Not discrediting any information from you or these people, but I just don't buy it...Not one tiny bit at all...

ETA: From the published paper: (simulations for theories and "popular formation scenarios")....WOW

The statistics of extrasolar planetary systems indicate that the default mode of planet formation generates planets with orbital periods shorter than 100 days and masses substantially exceeding that of the Earth. When viewed in this context, the Solar System is unusual. Here, we present simulations which show that a popular formation scenario for Jupiter and Saturn, in which Jupiter migrates inward from a > 5 astronomical units (AU) to a ≈ 1.5 AU before reversing direction, can explain the low overall mass of the Solar System’s terrestrial planets, as well as the absence of planets with a < 0.4 AU. Jupiter’s inward migration entrained s ≳ 10−100 km planetesimals into low-order mean motion resonances, shepherding and exciting their orbits. The resulting collisional cascade generated a planetesimal disk that, evolving under gas drag, would have driven any preexisting short-period planets into the Sun. In this scenario, the Solar System’s terrestrial planets formed from gas-starved mass-depleted debris that remained after the primary period of dynamical evolution.

a reply to: kevinp2300

Jupiter certainly keeps the inner planets somewhat safe by soaking up stray comets and asteroids heading in our direction by way of her immense gravitational pull. As is evidenced by comet Shoemaker–Levy 9.

Somewhat of a cosmic vacuum cleaner really.

en.wikipedia.org...

originally posted by: Chrisfishenstein
a reply to: kevinp2300

How in the hell could someone even speculate that something was "thrown" into the sun billions of years ago? Maybe it's me, but most people in the scientific community will even believe this crap shoveled at them....There is absolutely zero proof that things like this even in the slightest bit "might" have happened....But I guess everyone needs to listen to the scientists, they know what went on oh so long ago...Not discrediting any information from you or these people, but I just don't buy it...Not one tiny bit at all...

ETA: From the published paper: (simulations for theories and "popular formation scenarios")....WOW

The statistics of extrasolar planetary systems indicate that the default mode of planet formation generates planets with orbital periods shorter than 100 days and masses substantially exceeding that of the Earth. When viewed in this context, the Solar System is unusual. Here, we present simulations which show that a popular formation scenario for Jupiter and Saturn, in which Jupiter migrates inward from a > 5 astronomical units (AU) to a ≈ 1.5 AU before reversing direction, can explain the low overall mass of the Solar System’s terrestrial planets, as well as the absence of planets with a < 0.4 AU. Jupiter’s inward migration entrained s ≳ 10−100 km planetesimals into low-order mean motion resonances, shepherding and exciting their orbits. The resulting collisional cascade generated a planetesimal disk that, evolving under gas drag, would have driven any preexisting short-period planets into the Sun. In this scenario, the Solar System’s terrestrial planets formed from gas-starved mass-depleted debris that remained after the primary period of dynamical evolution.

My thoughts exactly!

There is no way anyone could know if this played out or not.

Unless we one day find some massive light/gravity circle that allows us to peer back into history, we will never ever know how all these things really formed.

originally posted by: Chrisfishenstein
a reply to: kevinp2300

How in the hell could someone even speculate that something was "thrown" into the sun billions of years ago?

Because we now have good statistics on the types of planetary systems out there and most contain a SuperEarth of some kind and usually several. They are the most common type of planet out there.

These are planets between the mass and size of the Earth and Neptune but our solar system does not contain such a planet.

Furthermore these types of planets routinely form in planet formation models so the fact that we do not have one indicates something might have happened early in our solar system's formation.

We know that Jupiter was more than capable of booting planets back then and there is a good reason to suspect that it probably did as the mass of the cloud which collapsed into forming the Sun and our Solar System seems to exceed what is accounted for in the current 8 planets, plus dwarf planets, asteroids, comets, the Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud.

When we run the clock backwards, there should have been more planets in our Solar System so they had to have been flung out or into the Sun and Jupiter is kinda bad ass as far as planets go so it's the prime suspect...

a reply to: Chrisfishenstein
I didn't see where it was definitively stated that this was exactly what happened. These researchers used known facts and current observations, and devised a plausible theory of what may have occurred in the past. Should new information come to light, the theory will be revised. It's called "science".

originally posted by: 8675309jenny

originally posted by: Chrisfishenstein
a reply to: kevinp2300

How in the hell could someone even speculate that something was "thrown" into the sun billions of years ago? Maybe it's me, but most people in the scientific community will even believe this crap shoveled at them....There is absolutely zero proof that things like this even in the slightest bit "might" have happened....But I guess everyone needs to listen to the scientists, they know what went on oh so long ago...Not discrediting any information from you or these people, but I just don't buy it...Not one tiny bit at all...

ETA: From the published paper: (simulations for theories and "popular formation scenarios")....WOW

The statistics of extrasolar planetary systems indicate that the default mode of planet formation generates planets with orbital periods shorter than 100 days and masses substantially exceeding that of the Earth. When viewed in this context, the Solar System is unusual. Here, we present simulations which show that a popular formation scenario for Jupiter and Saturn, in which Jupiter migrates inward from a > 5 astronomical units (AU) to a ≈ 1.5 AU before reversing direction, can explain the low overall mass of the Solar System’s terrestrial planets, as well as the absence of planets with a < 0.4 AU. Jupiter’s inward migration entrained s ≳ 10−100 km planetesimals into low-order mean motion resonances, shepherding and exciting their orbits. The resulting collisional cascade generated a planetesimal disk that, evolving under gas drag, would have driven any preexisting short-period planets into the Sun. In this scenario, the Solar System’s terrestrial planets formed from gas-starved mass-depleted debris that remained after the primary period of dynamical evolution.

My thoughts exactly!

There is no way anyone could know if this played out or not.

Unless we one day find some massive light/gravity circle that allows us to peer back into history, we will never ever know how all these things really formed.

Actually physics allows us to look back in time routinely, but not the way you think. Think of a recording of an egg being dropped.

If you run that backwards you can kind of sort out the shape of the egg.

If there were pieces of the shell missing when it was put back together those would pop out too.

Our solar system today is kind of like the egg after it was dropped. By running time backwards based on both models as well as real observations of planets forming around other young stars, we know roughly what the protoplanetary disc our Solar System formed out of was like but it what becomes clear is that it should have made more stuff than we see right now.

originally posted by: andy06shake
a reply to: kevinp2300

Jupiter certainly keeps the inner planets somewhat safe by soaking up stray comets and asteroids heading in our direction by way of her immense gravitational pull. As is evidenced by comet Shoemaker–Levy 9.

Somewhat of a cosmic vacuum cleaner really.

en.wikipedia.org...

I've heard the opposite is the case - that the Earth is MORE at risk of being hit by stray comets for precisely the same reason.

a reply to: CJCrawley

It was my understanding given the fact Jupiter presents a somewhat larger target than our Earth, gravitation wise and also in size, and given her location, that she tends to capture most comets that are directed inwards toward our star from the outer regions of space, that come into the influence of her immense gravity well.

Im not suggesting that she captures all of them considering the fact that our own Moon is covered in craters but she seems to been doing an ok job, at least for the last 65 million years or so.

a reply to: Chrisfishenstein

I'm with you. It's all theories. We don't know nearly as much as our self-important minds like to think, and we cling to theories like they're fact.

a reply to: Chrisfishenstein

But there is enough evidence to say this might have happened. There are sophisticated models ran, as well as enough observations from other solar systems formations to show that an event MIGHT have happened to cause our current planetary alignment.

a reply to: kevinp2300

We don't really know enough about gravity never mind orbital mechanics to predict what happened to our Solar System in the distant past especially so regarding the formation of our planetary bodies. These simulations just like all other science is simply our best guess based on the information we have available.

We can however say that our Earth has remained relatively hit free from any significantly sized asteroid of the TKO variety for the last 65 million years and also that we have indeed witnessed Jupiter capture and devour Comet Shoemaker Levy 9.