I had someone ask me this and I didn't have an answer, so I thought maybe someone here could help me. What is it that makes planets run relatively linear to each other in an orbit. I know that they aren't perfectly aligned with each other, but they do see to rotate around the sun in the a very similar linear direction.
I'll elaborate more if I'm not painting a clear picture here if you need me to.
2006-07-27 05:20:51 · 5 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
It is my understanding that the solar system was once a spinning disc or spiral of gaseous material around an axis of rotation. Given time, gravity and many collisions and aggregations of material this developed into the sun and planets which orbit on a roughly similar plane.
2006-07-27 05:30:37 · answer #1 · answered by Robert A 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
As I understand it, the dust cloud that the star and it's planets form from tends to have a spin rather than being just an amorphous blob of gas and dust. As the cloud coalesces into solid bodies these bodies all have a tendency to be spinning in the same direction and along the same plane.
2006-07-27 12:26:24 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
I think you mean planar orbits. The planets may have been flung into orbit around the sun by an impact that "splashed" up the planets into the co-planar (approximately) orbits. That's my theory.
2006-07-27 12:24:42 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Are you asking why the planets all tend to orbit in a single plane?
2006-07-27 12:24:28 · answer #4 · answered by Oh Boy! 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
gravity is the best answer i beleive, look at the astroid belt that leis after mars, that whole belt could have possiblly have been a nother planet, but the gravity from mars, and saturn would not let it form, remember...gravity is our friend!
2006-07-27 12:26:17 · answer #5 · answered by close_my_eyes2002 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋