UNIT U

SECTION 8.1 THE SEARCH FOR ORIGINS

Any theory of solar system formation must explain: patterns of motion, why there are 2
categories of planets, the existence of asteroid belt, Kuiper belt, and Oort cloud, the
general patterns as well as any exceptions
Immanuel Kant and Pierre-Simon Laplace both said solar system formed from a
collapsing nebula
o Evolved into nebular theory with more evidence
SECTION 8.2 THE BIRTH OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM
Solar nebula: piece of interstellar cloud from which our solar system formed
o Contained mostly H and He, with a 2% heavier elements formed in earlier stars
o Sun and outer planets made of H and He, terrestrial planets made mostly of the
heavier elements
Causes of Orderly Patterns
Solar nebula was probably spread out into a rough sphere, a few light years in diameter
Collapse could have been triggered by a cataclysmic event
Heating: temp of solar nebula increased as it collapsed
o Gravitational potential energy converted into kinetic energy then thermal energy,
then Sun formed in center where it got the hottest
Spinning: nebula rotated faster and faster as cloud shrank (conservation of angular
momentum)
o Kept some material from collapsing into the center
Flattening: colliding particles causes the material to flatten into a disk
o Collisions make orbits more circular, why all planets have nearly circular orbits
Supported by computer models and observations of other nebulae
SECTION 8.3 THE FORMATION OF PLANETS
Causes of the 2 Different Types of Planets
After Sun formed, material was too spread out for gravity alone to form planets
When temperature fell, some particles condensed out of the gas, gradually grew bigger
o Mostly hydrogen compounds, rock, and metal condensed, no H or He gas
Metal and some rock condensed near where Mercury is
More types of rock and metal condensed near where Venus, Earth and Mars are
Dark, carbon-rich minerals and some water were able to condense in the asteroid belt
area
o Frost line: the distance at which it was cold enough for ice to condense (b/w Mars
and Jupiter)
Beyond this point, the seeds from which planets formed were made of ice
and metal and rock
Much more H compounds in system than rocks and metals

How Terrestrial Planets Formed

Small metal seeds grew larger through accretion: small pieces began sticking together
after colliding by electrostatic forces, then gravity began to help form planetesimals:
pieces of planets
As planetesimals grew, they had more area to collide with other pieces and more gravity
Planetesimal collision with other planetesimals in other orbits could produce
fragmentation
How Jovian Planets Formed
Accretion like terrestrial planets
Contained many more ices, explains existence of ice-rich comets and moons
Gravity drew H and He gas around large icy planetesimals
Planets surrounded by their own gas disks, which formed their many moons
End of Planet Formation
Extra gas not used in formation was swept away by radiation and solar wind
o Solar system would be very different if the gas lingered or blew away earlier
Early sun would have rotated quickly at the center of the disk of the solar nebula
o Transferred angular momentum to charged particles which were then blown into
space by stellar wind
SECTION 8.4 THE AFTERMATH OF PLANET FORMATION
Asteroids and Comets
Asteroids are rocky leftover planetesimals of the inner solar system
o Asteroid belt could have contained enough material to form another planet but
most of it was ejected from solar system
Comets are ice-rich leftover planetesimals of the outer solar system
o Those that had a gravitational encounter with a jovian planet were kicked out of
their orbit and now circle the Sun from very far away (Oort cloud)
Exceptions
Heavy bombardment: period in the first few hundred million years after solar system
formed during which the tail end of planetary accretion created most of the craters found
on ancient planetary surfaces
o How water was brought to the rocky earth from outer solar system
Some of the large moons that orbit in the opposite direction from their planets rotation
were probably planetesimals that were captured by the planets gravity
Our Moon
If a very large planetesimal collided with early Earth, any number of things could have
happened, but the extra material would have collected into orbit around Earth
o Moons composition is very similar to Earths
First steps of solar system formation are inevitable, but giant impacts and further steps
are random
SECTION 8.5 AGE OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM

Age of a rock = the time since the rock last solidified

Radiometric dating: process of determining the age of a rock by comparing present
amount of a radioactive substance to the amount of its decay product
Radioactive isotope: a nucleus that can undergo spontaneous change (radioactive decay)
Oldest rocks on Earth are 4 billion yrs old, but that is not nearly as old as the solar system
Radiometric dating of meteorites show 4.55 billion years, this marks the beginning of
accretion in the solar nebula, which occurred w/in a few tens of millions of years

SECTION 13.3 FORMATION OF OTHER SOLAR SYSTEMS

Some extrasolar planets differ from nebular theory in that jovian planets are much closer
to the star
o After much examination, nebular theory is still the basic outline and close jovian
planets must have undergone a sort of planetary migration
Planetary Migration
o Orbiting planet nudges particles in the disk, causing them to bunch up into dense
regions, which exert gravity on planet, causing it to lose orbital energy and move
toward the star
o It is possible for stars to engulf these jovian planets
o Could also be a result of gravitational encounters with many planetesimals
Highly eccentric orbits could be a result of massive planets having gravitational
encounters with each other