Kiss Jupiter Good-bye

A majority of the planets that have been found outside our solar system, or exosolar planets, are gas giants like Jupiter. Unlike Jupiter, however, they are positioned precariously close to their parent stars, sometimes within the orbit of Mercury. Scientists aren’t sure what causes such large planets to form so close to their suns, but have a few ideas that might work.

Gas giants like Jupiter and Saturn start out as larger than average rocks, much like the Earth and the terrestrial planets. Slowly, over the course of their lifetime, they start to accrete gas because of their noticeable mass. A popular theory is that Jupiter is a failed companion star to the Sun. Most of the stars in the night sky are actually binary systems, or a pair of stars that orbit around a common center. With a planet like Jupiter dominating the solar system, it’s a cause for concern if anything develops about its future path.

By observing planets outside the solar system, scientists have devised a model that might explain why so many planets are so close to their parent. Its possible that large gas giants like Jupiter can migrate inwards from their orbit (Jupiter is currently five times further from the sun than we are), and end up in a ridiculously close orbit to the sun. (Don’t worry, this will take eons to happen)

But yes, it also means that Jupiter will one day swallow Earth, if such motion is possible in solar systems such as ours. It also means that once Jupiter is close enough, it will cause its own death. Based on simulations run by researchers at the University College London ran a few simulations as to what might happen should Jupiter grow dangerously close to the sun. At .15 AU, or well inside Mercury’s orbit, then the atmosphere begins to destabilize and get stripped away. Further away from the sun, Jupiter’s own atmosphere is able to keep itself cool, along with a nifty effect created from H3+, which is a charged form of hydrogen in Jupiter’s atmosphere. The H3+ helps reflect solar radiation into space and thereby keeps the planet’s temperature down. As Jupiter was drawn closer to the sun in the simulation, more H3+ was created until about .15 AU, where the atmosphere heated up and production of H3+ stopped.

Before all this happens, however, Jupiter is going to have a nice lunch on the terrestrial planets. While it’s on the move, Mars, Earth, and Venus, will most likely get torn apart as they are drawn into Jupiter’s large gravitational well. Scientists believe this might be why we can’t see many terrestrial planets in systems where the gas giants are so close to the sun. It’s possible the gas giant has already eaten them and is on its way to its own death.

The theory that Jupiter is going to swallow the earth is immensely interesting because it’s just one more bit of evidence that the universe is not at all a safe place, and even the relative stability of our own solar system is subject to disturbing motion. In the past, Jupiter has protected us from asteroid hits and a great deal of debris colliding with earth that might have killed any life on the planet. And, if this new theory is correct, it might wipe out earth just as easily as it protected our small little rock.