Study Says Sun Could Disrupt Solar System 100 Times Faster, Ejecting Planets Within 10 Billion Years
Updated
Updated · ScienceAlert · Oct 9
Study Says Sun Could Disrupt Solar System 100 Times Faster, Ejecting Planets Within 10 Billion Years
1 articles · Updated · ScienceAlert · Oct 9
Summary
Nearly 80% of the study’s 48 most realistic simulations showed the outer planets crossing orbits before the Sun even finished shedding its outer layers, pointing to instability far earlier than standard models predicted.
The shift comes from modeling the Sun’s death as about 4,600 random mass-loss “kicks” rather than a smooth fade, with each burst ejecting roughly one ten-thousandth of the Sun’s mass—about 33 Earths—and slightly altering its gravity.
In 90% of all runs, at least one giant planet was ultimately lost and the Solar System unraveled within 3 billion years after the Sun became a white dwarf; Saturn was among planets that could be flung into interstellar space.
Gaia observations of white-dwarf binary systems helped motivate the kick model, and the authors say the result could extend beyond our system because 97% of stars die this way.