planetary formation
How planets form
Planetary formation is the process by which planets develop from the disk of gas and dust surrounding a young star.
Material clumps together through gravity, growing from microscopic particles to planetesimals to full planets over millions of years.
The term appears in astronomy and astrophysics: Scientists study planetary formation to understand how our solar system came to be.
- silicatesSilicon-oxygen bonded minerals
- accretionGrowth through external addition
- runaway growthIncrease exceeding all constraints
- building blocksBasic units for construction
- metalsLustrous conductive elements
collision · habitable zone · fragmentation · stellar nursery · organic molecules · shock waves · angular momentum · isotopes · turbulence · tidal forces · noble gases · ices · hydrodynamics · gravitational collapse · solar nebula · eccentricity · inclination · molten
- originsbeginning, birth, creation, source, roots
- planetary scienceatmospheres, differentiation, regolith, gas giants, outgassing
- planetsEarth, planets, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn
- cosmologybig bang, Big Bang, big bang theory, universe, dark matter
- cosmic historybig bang, inflation, dark ages, recombination, nucleosynthesis
- Rocky PlanetsEarth, Mars, Venus, rocky planets, super-Earths