Overview of the Solar System

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asteroids and alike rotate in elliptical orbits around it in the same plane. The smaller inner planets have solid surfaces, lack ring systems and have far fewer satellites then the outer planets. Atmospheres of most of the inner planets consist of large quantities of oxidized compounds such as carbon dioxide. While on the other hand, the outer planets are far more massive than the inner terrestrial planets, and have gigantic atmospheres composed mainly of hydrogen and helium. Asteroids and comets make up the smallest portion of the solar systems entities and are composed of the remnants left behind while planets were forming.
For over 300 years, there has been a very long history of speculation on the origin of the solar system. These many theories stem from two general categories. The first category called monistic, involves the evolution of the Sun and planets as an isolated system. The second group of theories called dualistic, suggested that the solar system formed as a result ...

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that the pre-solar nebula continued to collapse until the center of the cloud became so dense that heat started to form. This heat increased the thermal pressure of the cloud until the collapse was eventually halted. The existence of our system of planets is entirely due to the angular momentum of the initial cloud. If there were no angular momentum, then the interstellar cloud would have collapsed to form a single star. While at the same time, if the collapse had occurred under a system with too much angular momentum then a binary star would have resulted from our system. Our system formed under intermediate conditions allowing the planets to evolve. The fact that the Sun contains 99 ...

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