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The Early Solar System’s Magnetic Field Sped Planet Formation

posted by n1 on Thursday November 20 2014, @02:27AM   Printer-friendly
from the force-is-strong dept.

AnonTechie writes with an article from Ars Technica:

One aspect of planetary formation has remained enigmatic. Observations of young star systems indicate that it usually takes less than five million years for the star’s planets to form—perhaps much less. For that to happen, there must be a really efficient mechanism to bring mass into the protoplanetary disk in which the planets form. Gravity alone doesn’t account for it happening so quickly.

Theoretical explanations abound for the fast accretion of material, some of which involve its interactions with a solar system's magnetic field. Until now, there’s been no way to test these models or determine the role of a magnetic field. By examining a meteorite, however, researchers found indications that the magnetic field in the early Solar System was sufficient to account for the short accretion time.

The researchers studied a meteorite called Semarkona - a space rock that crashed in northern India in 1940, which was filled with olivine-bearing chondrules. Chondrules are round grains that form as molten droplets but later accrete into the meteoroid they’re found in.

[Additional Coverage]: http://www.newsledge.com/one-meteorite-tells-us-solar-system-formed-11229

[Abstract]: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2014/11/12/science.1258022

[Source]: https://newsoffice.mit.edu/2014/strong-magnetic-field-early-solar-system-1113

 
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  • (Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday November 20 2014, @06:22AM

    by frojack (1554) on Thursday November 20 2014, @06:22AM (#118017) Journal

    By examining a meteorite, however, researchers found indications that the magnetic field in the early Solar System was sufficient to account for the short accretion time.

    There are thousands of metallic meteorites on display around the world, how many of them indicate this early magnetism?
     

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  • (Score: 2) by sudo rm -rf on Thursday November 20 2014, @11:01AM

    by sudo rm -rf (2357) on Thursday November 20 2014, @11:01AM (#118065) Journal

    You're right that one is not statistically relevant, but it's not expected there are many with this one's particular properties (from TFA):

    He and his colleagues chose to analyze the Semarkona meteorite because of its reputation as a pristine sample from the early solar system.
    “This thing has the unusual advantage of being unaltered, but also happens to be a really excellent magnetic recording device,” Weiss says. “When it formed, it formed the right kind of metal. Many things, even though pristine, didn’t form the right magnetic recording properties. So this thing is really high-fidelity.”