Without Jupiter, Earth may have spiraled into the sun long ago

Jupiter may have made Earth habitable, study finds

Without Jupiter, primitive Earth might have drifted too close to the sun, rendering it incapable of hosting life, a study from Rice University in Houston reveals. That's one potential interpretation from new research that started with another curiosity: Scientists have long wondered why the earliest solid objects in the solar system didn't all form at the same time. Evidence from meteorites, the rocky space debris that falls to Earth, shows two …

Without Jupiter, Earth may have spiraled into the sun long ago

New research shows how Jupiter carved out rings and gaps that changed how and when planets and meteorites formed.

Jupiter may have reshaped our solar system in dramatic ways

New research suggests that the giant planet Jupiter reshaped the early solar system in dramatic ways. The work indicates Jupiter carved out rings and gaps that ultimately explain one of the longest-standing puzzles in planetary science: why many primitive meteorites formed millions of years after the first solid bodies. “Without [Jupiter], we might not have Earth as we know it.” The study, which combined hydrodynamic models of Jupiter’s growth w…