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A Possible Mechanism for the Capture of Microparticles by the Earth and Other Planets of the Solar System

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 April 2016

F. Di Benedetto*
Affiliation:
Rome UniversityRome, Italy

Abstract

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By application of Lyttleton’s theory for the formation of comets, it is shown that a possible mechanism for the origin and formation of a concentration of cosmic particles around the Earth and the other planets of the solar system exists.

In the vicinity of the neutral point, where the velocity of colliding particles is not greater than 6 km/s, it is found that if the solid particles after collision must remain in a solid state, there can be no possibility of accretion for Mercury, Mars, and the Moon, where the maximum value of the “closing-in parameter” p (distance of the center of the planet to the asymptotic trajectory) is less than the radius of the planet.

On the other hand, the capture radii of microparticles in solid form varies from a minimum of 2.95 planetary radii for Venus and 3.47 for the Earth, to about 986 for Jupiter.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © NASA 1971

References

Lyttleton, R. A., 1953. The Comets and Their Origin, Cambridge Univ. Press.Google Scholar