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Mysteries of Uranus' oddities explained by Japanese astronomers:
The ice giant Uranus' unusual attributes have long puzzled scientists. All of the planets in our Solar System revolve around the Sun in the same direction and in the same plane, which astronomers believe is a vestige of how our Solar System formed from a spinning disc of gas and dust. Most of the planets in our Solar System also rotate in the same direction, with their poles orientated perpendicular to the plane the planets revolve in. However, uniquely among all the planets, Uranus' is tilted over about 98 degrees.
[...] How Uranus' unusual set of properties came to be has now been explained by a research team led by Professor Shigeru Ida from the Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI) at Tokyo Institute of Technology. Their study suggests that early in the history of our Solar System, Uranus was struck by a small icy planet - roughly 1-3 times the mass of the Earth - which tipped the young planet over, and left behind its idiosyncratic moon and ring system as a 'smoking gun'.
The team came to this conclusion while they were constructing a novel computer simulation of moon formation around icy planets. [...] There is strong evidence Earth's own single moon formed when a rocky Mars-sized body hit the early Earth almost 4.5 billion years ago. This idea explains a great deal about the Earth and its Moon's composition, and the way the Moon orbits Earth.
[...] As Professor Ida explains, 'This model is the first to explain the configuration of Uranus' moon system, and it may help explain the configurations of other icy planets in our Solar System such as Neptune. Beyond this, astronomers have now discovered thousands of planets around other stars, so-called exoplanets, and observations suggest that many of the newly discovered planets known as super-Earths in exoplanetary systems may consist largely of water ice and this model can also be applied to these planets.'
Shigeru Ida1, Shoji Ueta2, Takanori Sasaki3, Yuya Ishizawa3. Uranian satellite formation by evolution of a water vapour disk generated by a giant impact, Nature Astronomy, DOI: 10.1038/s41550-020-1049-8
(Score: 5, Interesting) by DannyB on Monday April 06 2020, @09:35PM (2 children)
Back in the mid 90's I learned from cable tv that Uranus was probably struck by another body, tilting it on its side. Also that the Earth was probably hit by another object forming the Earth-moon pear. So this does not strike me as new information. Also that Saturn has such low density it would float in water (on Earth) if you had a big enough tub.
That documentary was narrated by Magnum PI (not the 3.14 pi). Most of that documentary's information came from the two VGER probes. This predated the heavily protested launch of Cassini/Huygens. Those were the days when cable tv was still worth watching.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Monday April 06 2020, @10:43PM
Planet-Shifting Collision Shaped Uranus’ “Rolling” Rotation [nasa.gov]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 07 2020, @09:37AM
This story is not new news as I remember reading astronomy books from the 80's and earlier about the possibility that the axis tilt of Uranus was caused by some 'great collision' early in it's formation. Uranus' unusual axis tilt was known for certain since the early 1900's IIRC, and probably suspected long before that when Herschel and other astronomers observed it's moons appeared at the top and bottom as well as on the left and right of the planet depending upon where uranus is in it's orbit. So it's not unrealistic to expect someone even in the early years of it's discovery 250 years ago to conceive that something big came along and knocked Uranus on it's ass.
Just what is with these old-is-new headlines? This is like the third story in 10 days here where someone today just "discovered" something that was known or was strongly suspected/suggested for decades or even centuries. Does nobody read anything else outside of Joe-nobody's posts on twitter and facebook?