How a planet is created

How were planets formed?

The various planets are thought to have formed from the solar nebula, the disc-shaped cloud of gas and dust left over from the Sun's formation. [ 36 ] The currently accepted method by which the planets formed is accretion, in which the planets began as dust grains in orbit around the central protostar.

Did the Solar System ever form a planet?

And like that, the solar system as we know it today was formed. There are still leftover remains of the early days though. Asteroids in the asteroid belt are the bits and pieces of the early solar system that could never quite form a planet. Way off in the outer reaches of the solar system are comets.

Where do planets come from?

Scientists think planets, including the ones in our solar system, likely start off as grains of dust smaller than the width of a human hair. They emerge from the giant, donut-shaped disk of gas and dust that circles young stars. Gravity and other forces cause material within the disk to collide.

How long does it take for a planet to form?

Studies of discs around other stars have also done much to establish a time frame for Solar System formation. Stars between one and three million years old have discs rich in gas, whereas discs around stars more than 10 million years old have little to no gas, suggesting that giant planets within them have ceased forming. [ 38 ]

How was the Solar System formed?

Formation of the Solar System after gas and dust coalesced into a protoplanetary disk. The vast majority of this material was sourced from a past supernova. In the long term, the greatest changes in the Solar System will come from changes in the Sun itself as it ages.

How did planets grow?

Through direct contact and self-organization, these grains formed into clumps up to 200 m (660 ft) in diameter, which in turn collided to form larger bodies (planetesimals) of ~10 km (6.2 mi) in size. These gradually increased through further collisions, growing at the rate of centimetres per year over the course of the next few million years.