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Re: The outer planets
- To: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com
- Subject: Re: The outer planets
- From: Ron Baalke <BAALKE@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov>
- Date: Wed, 10 Nov 1999 1:30:13 GMT
- Old-X-Envelope-To: <meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com>
- Resent-Date: Tue, 9 Nov 1999 20:30:37 -0500 (EST)
- Resent-From: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com
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>My question from scratch is: Couldn't our outer gaseous planets be former
>comets trapped in orbit around our sun during the early stages of the
>formation of our solar system? They have the same gases and a small rocky
>core. There are two immediate, obvious problems: They are very big and
>where's the ice?
Yes, I'm sure Jupiter has sucked in thousands of comets over the past
4.5 billion years. The water (or ice) is still on Jupiter.
Jupiter is believed to have three cloud layers in its atmosphere.
At the top are clouds of ammonia ice; beneath that ammonium-hydrogen
sulfide crystals; and in the lowest layer, water ice and perhaps liquid
water. The vivid colors of Jupiter's storms are probably caused by their
chemical content. Although there isn't much carbon in
Jupiter's atmosphere, carbon easily combines with hydrogen
and small amounts of oxygen to form a variety of organic
compounds. The orange and brown colors in Jupiter's clouds
may be due to the presence of these organic compounds, or
sulfur and phosphorus.
Ron Baalke
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