Eli5: Oort clouds. Why do we not see them anywhere else yet accept that they are apart of our solar system?
In: Physics
The Oort cloud is theoretical and we do not have direct observational evidence that it exists in our solar system. It is a means to explain the continued appearance of things like comets. We do not currently have anything launched that will be able to observe and report on the Oort cloud by the time they reach where it is theorized to be.
We do sort of see the objects in the Oort cloud. Some of these objects have gotten a very elongated orbit and does pass close to the Sun where we can see them. We know they are fairly new objects as they would melt away in the heat of the Sun if they go around many times. In fact we do see commets melting away already. And we do know they do not come from further away because then the gravitation of the Sun would have accelerated them up to higher speeds. They all seam to have a speed suggesting that they fall from about 1000 to 100,000 AU from the Sun. The closest stars are ten times further away. So we know there is something out that that is generating all these commets which comes from every direction.
We don’t see dark energy but are aware of it too.
We have evidence of the oort cloud in the form of long orbit asteroids which come from beyond pluto. They have to come from somewhere
Latest Answers