Scientists have said the fireball that originated at the edge of the solar system was likely made of rock, not ice, calling into question long-held ideas about how the solar system formed.
Right at the edge of our solar system and halfway to the nearest stars is a cluster of icy objects floating in space known as the Oort Cloud. Passing stars sometimes nudge these icy travelers toward the sun, and scientists see them as comets with long tails. Theoretically, the very basis for understanding the origin of our solar system is built on the fact that in these remote areas there are only ice objects and, of course, nothing stone.
That changed in 2021, when an international team of scientists, stargazers, professional and amateur astronomers, led by Western meteorological physicists, took photos and videos of a rocky meteoroid as it flew across the sky above central Alberta in a ball. of blinding fire. Since then, scientists have concluded that all signs point to the object sitting right in the middle of the Oort cloud. The results were published in the journal Nature astronomy.
“This discovery supports an entirely different model for the formation of the solar system, which supports the idea that a significant amount of rocky material coexists with icy objects in the Oort cloud. This result is not explained by the currently preferred models for solar system formation. This is a game changer,” said Denis Vida, a meteor physics researcher.
All previous stone fireballs have come much closer to Earth, which makes this body, which has apparently traveled great distances, completely unexpected. Modern cameras at the Global Fireball Observatory (GFO), developed in Australia and operated by the University of Alberta, have observed a rocky meteoroid the size of a grapefruit (about 2 kg). Using instruments from the Global Meteor Network, the scientists calculated that it is moving in an orbit normally reserved only for long-period icy comets from the Oort cloud.
“In 70 years of regular fireball sightings, this is one of the most unusual on record. It confirms the GFO strategy, developed five years ago, which expanded the “fishing net” to 5 million square kilometers of sky and brought together scientific research from around the world. Not only does this allow us to find and study precious meteorites, but it’s the only way to capture these rarer phenomena that are essential to understanding our solar system,” said Hadrien Devillepoix, a researcher at Curtin University, Australia, and GFO Principal Investigator.
During its flight, the Alberta fireball plummeted much deeper into the atmosphere than icy objects in similar orbits, and shattered much like a fireball dropping stone meteorites, the much-needed proof that it really was made of stone. In contrast, comets are mostly fluffy snowballs mixed with dust that slowly evaporate as they get closer to the Sun. The dust and gas inside them form a kind of tail that can stretch for millions of kilometers.
“We want to explain how this rocky meteoroid got this far because we want to understand our origins. The better we understand the conditions under which the solar system was formed, the better we understand what was needed for life to emerge, ”said the scientist.
Cursor wrote it earlier scientists have discovered an interesting fact about the earth’s magnetic field. The interplanetary collision that formed the moon may have more ties to Earth’s early history than we ever imagined.
Same Scientists have discovered a startling fact about Earth’s gravity. According to scientists, like all planets, the Earth is a product of gravity.
said the cursor scientists have modeled what Earth will look like in 300 million years.
Recall this scientists said whether the Earth can leave our solar system.
