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~ 50 million years before formation of the Solar System 4.6 bya: If the Solar System formed in an Orion Nebula-like star-forming region, the most massive stars are formed, live their lives, die, and explode in supernova. One particular supernova, called the primal supernova, possibly triggers the formation of the Solar System. [19] [20 ...
Diagram of the early Solar System's protoplanetary disk, out of which Earth and other Solar System bodies formed. The Solar System formed at least 4.568 billion years ago from the gravitational collapse of a region within a large molecular cloud. [b] This initial cloud was likely several light-years across and probably birthed several stars. [14]
This model posits that, 4.6 billion years ago, the Solar System was formed by the gravitational collapse of a giant molecular cloud spanning several light-years. Many stars, including the Sun, were formed within this collapsing cloud. The gas that formed the Solar System was slightly more massive than the Sun itself.
The nebular hypothesis is the most widely accepted model in the field of cosmogony to explain the formation and evolution of the Solar System (as well as other planetary systems). It suggests the Solar System is formed from gas and dust orbiting the Sun which clumped up together to form the planets.
Planetesimals that have survived to the current day are valuable to science because they contain information about the formation of the Solar System. Although their exteriors are subjected to intense solar radiation that can alter their chemistry, their interiors contain pristine material essentially untouched since the planetesimal was formed.
The Sun and planets of the Solar System (distances not to scale). The Solar System is the gravitationally bound system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it. It formed about 4.6 billion years ago when a dense region of a molecular cloud collapsed, forming the Sun and a protoplanetary disc.
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The original gas and small dust particles have been dispersed or accumulated into planets. [14] Zodiacal cloud or interplanetary dust is the material in the Solar System created by collisions of asteroids and evaporation of comet seen to observers on Earth as a band of scattered light along the ecliptic before sunrise or after sunset.