Related papers: Explaining Mercury via a single giant impact is hi…
The current standard theory of the origin of the Moon is that the Earth was hit by a giant impactor the size of Mars causing ejection of iron poor impactor mantle debris that coalesced to form the Moon. But where did this Mars-sized…
We present integrations of a model Solar System with five terrestrial planets (beginning ~30-50 Myr after the formation of primitive Solar System bodies) in order to determine the preferred regions of parameter space leading to a giant…
Embryos of the Moon and the Earth may have formed as a result of contraction of a common parental rarefied condensation. The required angular momentum of this condensation could largely be acquired in a collision of two rarefied…
The earliest stage of the evolution of a fully assembled planet is profoundly affected by a number of basin-forming impacts large enough to change the dynamics of its deeper interior. These impacts are in some cases quite closely spaced and…
The giant impact hypothesis is the dominant theory explaining the formation of our Moon. However, its inability to produce an isotopically similar Earth-Moon system with correct angular momentum has cast a shadow on its validity.…
We present radiation hydrodynamic simulations in which binary planets form by close encounters in a system of several super-Earth embryos. The embryos are embedded in a protoplanetary disk consisting of gas and pebbles and evolve in a…
The paper discusses a model of the bombardment of the Earth and the Moon by small bodies when these planets were formed. It is shown that the total ice mass delivered with the bodies to the Earth from the feeding zone of the giant planets…
Morbidelli, Kleine & Nimmo (2024) (MKN) recently published a critical analysis on whether the terrestrial planets in the Solar System formed by rapid pebble accretion or by the classical route of multiple giant impacts between planetary…
One of the longstanding unsolved problems of planet formation is how solid bodies of a few decimeters in size can "stick" to form large planetesimals. This is known as the "meter size barrier". In recent years it has become increasingly…
Super-Mercuries, rocky exoplanets with bulk iron mass fraction of more than 60 per cent, appear to be preferentially hosted by stars with higher iron mass fraction than the Earth. It is unclear whether these iron-rich planets can form in…
Reproducing the large Earth/Mars mass ratio requires a strong mass depletion in solids within the protoplanetary disk between 1 and 3 AU. The Grand Tack model invokes a specific migration history of the giant planets to remove most of the…
The giant impact (GI) is one of the most important hypotheses both in planetary science and geoscience, since it is related to the origin of the Moon and also the initial condition of the Earth. A number of numerical simulations have been…
The Earth, Venus, Mars, and some extrasolar terrestrial planets have a mass and radius that is consistent with a mass fraction of about 30% metallic core and 70% silicate mantle. At the inner frontier of the solar system, Mercury has a…
Many features of the outer solar system are replicated in numerical simulations if the giant planets undergo an orbital instability that ejects one or more ice giants. During this instability, Jupiter and Saturn's orbits diverge, crossing…
Late accretion is a process that strongly modulated surface geomorphic and geochemical features of Mercury. Yet, the fate of the impactors and their effects on Mercury's surface through the bombardment epoch are not clear. Using Monte-Carlo…
The angular momentum of the present Earth-Moon system could be acquired at the collision of two identical rarefied condensations with sizes of Hill spheres which total mass was about 0.1 of the mass of the Earth. Solid embryos of the Earth…
Evidence in the Solar System suggests that the giant planets underwent an epoch of radial migration that was very rapid, with an e-folding timescale shorter than 1~Myr. It is probable that the cause of this migration was that the giant…
Planets and the stars they orbit are born from the same cloud of gas and dust, and the primordial compositions of rocky exoplanets have been assumed to have iron and refractory abundance ratios consistent with their host star. To test this…
The solar system's terrestrial planets are thought to have accreted over millions of years out of a sea of smaller embryos and planetesimals. Because it is impossible to know the surface density profile for solids and size frequency…
Planets and stars are expected to be compositionally linked because they accrete from the same material reservoir. However, astronomical observations revealed the existence of exoplanets whose bulk density is far higher than what is…