What was the solar system like before the migration of all the planets?

The first planetary migrations into the solar system have long been established, and a myriad of theories have been put forward to explain where the planets came from. Theories such as the Grand Tack Hypothesis and the Nice Model show how important migration is to the current state of our solar system. Now, a team from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has come up with a new way of trying to understand patterns of planetary migration: by examining meteorite compositions.

The researchers, led by post-doctoral fellow Jan Render, had three key achievements. First, almost all meteorites that have fallen to Earth originate from the asteroid belt. Second, the asteroid belt is known to have formed by sweeping up material from all over the solar system. And third, and perhaps most importantly, they could analyze the isotopic signatures of meteorites to help determine where a given asteroid had formed in the solar system.

With this knowledge, they could then extrapolate to other asteroids of the same type. There are approximately 100 different types of asteroids, with different isotopic signatures, in the asteroid belt. The team used a technique to measure the nucleosynthetic isotope signatures of several samples of basalt achondrites, a type of stony meteorite.

They were looking for neodymium (Nd) and zirconium (Zr) concentrates, which were lacking in some types of presolar materials. This meant that understanding the amount of Nd and Zr in a specific type of asteroid will allow them to understand where in the pre-solar solar system that type of asteroid formed.

Link their Earth findings to asteroids in the asteroid belt, then to other models of how different parts of the asteroid belt ended up where they were, and the planet they were closest to. , allowed researchers to create a complete map of the early solar system with models of how each of the planets moved into their current positions.

There is still more data to be collected regarding these planetary migrations. Using meteorites that have actually landed on Earth is an innovative and hopefully inspiring way to make the most of all the data available. Maybe there is even more information about the original Solar System hidden nearby.

Learn more:
LLNL: Putting the Pieces Together – Rebuilding the Original Architecture of the Solar System
Science Mag: Cataclysmic attacks on giant planets took place early in our solar system’s history
UT: Did Jupiter push Venus into a runaway greenhouse?

Main image credit: NASA