Written by Mounis Hawass
Monday, April 15, 2024 01:00 AM
Scientists conducted a little digging inside UranusAnd they found something surprising, as they believe that there is a lot more methane than we thought. The idea that Uranus is full of gas may not come as a surprise to many – but what is strange is that it is not in the form of gas. All of the methane packed into Uranus is either frozen or… “mushy”.
In fact, about 10% of the planet Uranus may be made up of this soft methane, and not filled with water ice as previously thought – hence the name ‘ice giant’. The new theory goes back to how Uranus grew to its massive size when it was the solar system. Is formed.
All plants began their lives in a huge dust cloud around the sun. Gradually, this dust began to gather together, like dust bunnies under the sofa. As they grew, they collected more dust, becoming larger and larger, and this meant their gravitational pull increased as well, allowing them to pull in more matter, including objects known as planetesimals, which can range in size from a few miles across to several hundred miles across. Casually.
These massive objects, which settled inside Uranus, are thought to resemble comets that come from the Kuiper Belt, and have found their way beyond the planets. However, if this is true, it is a bit of a head-scratcher. These comets are not made of materials useful for making water, so if Uranus is full of them, why would it be full of ice, too?
That’s the question Uri Malamud and his colleagues asked and answered in a new study that has not yet been peer-reviewed. Because it is so far away, we know very little about Uranus. Only one spacecraft, Voyager 2, has passed by it, but using data from these telescopes and ground-based telescopes. Astronomers were able to predict that the planet contains a thin outer layer of hydrogen and helium, and a rocky core. It is believed that in the middle there is frozen water, perhaps equivalent to 50 thousand of the water found on Earth.
However, using an algorithm to recreate Uranus using a variety of chemicals, the team found models that most resembled the planet as we know it, and those models were filled with methane. The methane is thought to exist either in solid pieces, or in a “soft state” between the layers. The planet’s exterior and ice layer.
And all that methane in Uranus could explain the source of the water ice, which formed when hydrogen in the young planet interacted with carbon and organic-rich materials in the planetesimals.
Which means that without all that methane, Uranus wouldn’t be what it is today.
