New Theory on Formation of Solar System’s First Stuff
A new view of the solar system’s early days proposes that the first two kinds of solid materials — the precursors of space rocks and ultimately planets — both formed at the same time. When the sun was born about 4.6 billion years ago, it was surrounded by a cloud of gas and dust that eventually became the asteroids, comets and planets. An initial step in that process had to be the generation of clumps of solid material.
Previously, researchers believed the two known types of early solids formed several million years apart from each other. But a new dating technique from the University of Copenhagen’s James Connelly and fellow researchers shows different results. This means the early days of the solar system look different than previously thought. Connelly and his teammates propose their new model in a paper published in the journal Science.