Scientists have revealed that Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system was once smacked by a giant planet that had ten times the mass of the earth. The research report also added that the effects of this monumental crash can be still observed on the planet's Jovian core.
After analyzing data sent by NASA's Juno spacecraft, scientists hypothesized that this violent collision had happened at least 4.5 billion years ago, after the dispersal of the primordial disk of dust and gas that eventually resulted in the creation of the solar system.
The study conducted by researchers from the United States, China, Japan, and Switzerland the core of Jupiter might be more diffuse with lots of heavy elements. Scientists revealed that the diffused core of Jupiter is a clear indication that the space body had faced a severe blow from a planet-sized object just a few years after its formation.
"We believe that impacts, and in particular giant impacts, might have been rather common during the infancy of the solar system. For example, we believe that our moon formed after such an event. However, the impact that we postulate for Jupiter is a real monster," said Andrea Isella, an astronomer at the Rice University in Houston, Reuters reports.
A few months back, Dr Iain McDonald, a scientist at the Cardiff University's school of earth and ocean sciences had suggested that earth will also face a similar fate in the future. As per McDonald, the possibilities of the earth being hit by a doomsday asteroid in the future are pretty high, and if it happens, it will trigger massive catastrophe in the planet.
In the meantime, NASA is apparently developing a planetary defense weapon to protect the earth from rogue space bodies. The United States space agency is planning to hit approaching space bodies using a giant spacecraft, and experts believe that it will deflect the original collision trajectory.
