• Question: How are planets formed?

    Asked by anon-356641 on 20 Mar 2023.
    • Photo: Lucien Heurtier

      Lucien Heurtier answered on 20 Mar 2023:

      Planets form after many many asteroids collide into each other. The bigger they get, the more they attract other things around them. That’s how planet form. It takes time, and a lot of asteroids.

      However, for a planet to become stable and exist for a long time, it also needs to not fall into a star! For one planet that remains, there are thousands which fell into the sun before the solar system became what it is now!

    • Photo: Vicky Fawcett

      Vicky Fawcett answered on 20 Mar 2023:

      Stars are formed when gas clumps together under gravity. The remaining dust that doesn’t form the star orbits the star because there is gravity. Eventually this also starts to clump up due to gravity, forming “planetesimals”. These baby planets continue to grow through collisions with other planetesimals until they sweep up the remaining material.

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