As though there was n’t already enough cool clobber in the cosmos , scientists say space may take for tremendous , spinning space donuts made of vesiculation - blistering vaporized rock . They publish their reputation in theJournal of Geophysical Research : satellite .
Planetary scientist Simon Lock and Sarah Stewart were trying to understand what happen when two planets clash . As we know from our own Earth , planet are not but dead rocks or ball of accelerator , but active , complex bodies , with always pitch temperatures , sphere , configuration , rotation , and gravity .
therefore , major planet - on - satellite wrecks are less like a shattering of rock and more like a figure - skating stroke , a sudden , midair arresting of whirling triple axels .
The impact of these crashes is so crimson , astronomers believe , that the two trunk involve are reduced to hot rubble . Over clip , that rubble aplomb and congeals , finally spinning and condensing into a newfangled celestial physical structure . It was this kind of smash - up , some scientist say , that create the Earth .
Lock and Stewart are n’t so sure about that . They think our planet ’s origins may have been bigger , and substantiallymore donut - shape . They hypothesize that the heat and momentum of these collision can fling spicy debris into a heavy , fat rotate band they call a synestia .
From there , the process is exchangeable : The vaporized rock poise and begins to adhere together , coalescing into a rocky babe major planet — and possibly a moon or two .
After centuries of cogitation , we ’re stillnot totally surehow our own Moonwas born . Much of its authorship is like to Earth ’s , which suggest , Lock and Stewart say , that the cosmic donut could have birth them both .
The term synestia is their excogitation , too , a portmanteau word of the prefixsyn , meaning “ together , ” and Hestia , the Hellenic goddess of plate , the hearth , and architecture .
A real synestia has yet to be spotted in outer space , but the scientists are confident that they ’ll turn up once we dig deeper into other solar system of rules .
