Why is Jupiter so Big? Did It Eat Baby Planets?
Jupiter’s mass is two times greater than other planets in the solar system. Ever wondered why? The only theory that makes sense in the given scenario is that it must’ve eaten other planets at the time of formation to become bigger than everyone. NASA’s Juno Mission has revealed several new facts about Jupiter which have brought several new theories.
A few hypotheses have been proposed by researchers to explain how Jupiter formed. There are two widely accepted ideas on its formation. It must’ve either formed through merging collisions of rock and ice that eventually developed to planetary size or from swirling clouds of gas that implode to create a dense nucleus.
A researcher produced a publication called Icarus in which he presented a few Juno Mission results. He acknowledged that the Jupiter core hasn't been investigated up to this point. They have no knowledge of its essence. Whether the core is a dense cloud of elements or composed of rocks is still a mystery. What's worrying is that they don't even have the capability to unravel the enigma of Jupiter's core.
NASA started the Juno Mission in 2016. Since then scientists are trying to figure out facts about Jupiter. They are constantly working and collecting images and information to know more about the biggest planet. Sadly they haven’t found anything relevant yet. On the bright side they have collected enough data to analyze them and hopefully they will be able to have some important information about the planet soon.
The most recent discoveries provided perplexing evidence that the core part of Jupiter makes up three times as much of its body as previously believed. Older theories predicted that the center of the planet would have around 10% of its entire mass. Actually they discovered that it is more like 30%.
Jupiter is a lot heavier than was expected to be in the two previous models which both assumed that Jupiter was primarily composed of light helium and hydrogen. However scientists have now proposed a novel hypothesis. Jupiter could’ve eaten up young planets known as planetesimals. This may help to explain why it eventually developed such a dense core as it was assembling numerous smaller dense cores inside it.
The potential collision with a massive rocky body offers another explanation for Jupiter's bulk. The rocky substance may have shed some of its heavy metals during the collision which later integrated into Jupiter's core. The new theories might provide scientists with fresh avenues for planet-related research. They were already aware of its powerful gravitational attraction which may cause the development of several nearby planets. Yamila Miguel an astronomer at Leiden University asserts that Jupiter was essential to the development of the planets in our solar system.
The report can be of major importance in the line of astrophysics. It would develop the understanding of how giant planets form and how they impact other planets’ formation around them. Future high-resolution observations of the gaseous giant like those from NASA's Juno will be crucial according to Miguel in understanding the planet's past.
After putting every piece of information together it is still difficult to find out information about the formation of Jupiter. As it is not possible to watch directly [terrestrially] how Jupiter was formed it is going to be a difficult task for the researchers to collect more information about it.