Although Jupiter is the oldest and oldest planet, it is much more difficult to determine which is the youngest.
Jupiter is the oldest planet in the solar system.
Jupiter is the oldest planet in the solar system. (Photo: Hɑkan Akirmak Visuals/Artem Musaev/IƑLScience)
About 5 billion years ago, the Sun began to transform hydrogen into helium in its core to become a star in its own right. Surrounding the “newborn” Sun is a disc of matter consisting mainly of hydrogen from the nebula that makes up the Sun, in addition to more complex molecules. Interactions within this disc create particles of ice and dust, which continue to grow and interact with other particles. The air masses in the disk of matter also begin to separate from the rest. From this chaos, planets gradually formed.
The oldest planet
The first planet born, probably during the first 3 million years of the solar system, is Jupiter. It makes Jupiter so powerful and so huge, much larger than any other planet. Jupiter has 318 times the mass of Earth. In fact, the center of mass of the celestial system between Jupiter and the Sun – the point around which Jupiter orbits – is not the center of the Sun but lies just outside the surface. So Jupiter doesn’t even revolve exactly around the Sun.
after Jupiter, Saturn also began to develop. Next is Neptune and Uranus, although at the time of the formation of these two planets, Jupiter and Saturn carried large amounts of gas into the outer solar system. Among the moons of the solar system, Callisto, the moon of Jupiter, has the oldest surface.
Meanwhile, in the area deep within the solar system, 4 rocky planets and a dwarf planet gradually formed. Rocky planets take longer to form, possibly close to 100 million years, due to collisions between rocky bodies. Mars may have grown to its current size quickly, faster than Earth and Venus, but scientists don’t know exactly when. Normally, they estimate the age of solid objects based on the number of craters on the surface, but objects with variable surfaces complicate this task.
Earth (left) and Uranus (right) are perhaps the youngest planets.
Earth (left) and Uranus (right) are perhaps the youngest planets. (Picture: (Wikimedia).
The youngest planet
While it is possible to identify Jupiter as the oldest planet based on models of the formation process, finding the youngest planet is not easy. Another aspect to consider is that the planets should have masses and properties similar to those observed by humans today. If so, the title of the youngest planet is competition between Earth and Uranus. The reason these two planets became the youngest nominees has to do with the fact that They have all experienced major collisions.
Primordial Earth may have collided with Theia, a planet as large as Mars. The Moon probably also formed from this event which took place around 4.5 billion years ago. The Moon takes about 200 million years to solidify. The Earth that experiences tremors will need more time to become what it is today, with the formation of oceans and tectonic plates. Plate tectonics may have formed 3.6 billion years ago.
Three to four billion years ago, Uranus also collided with an Earth-sized body, causing its internal structure to be disrupted. The event causes Uranus to tilt and creates a strange magnetic field. Since both Earth and Uranus undergo such structural alterations, determining which planet is the youngest remains a puzzle.
Article source: VnExpress
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Although Jupiter is the oldest and oldest planet, it is much more difficult to determine which is the youngest.
