What crucial constraint on outer planet formation is implied by the need for Jupiter and Saturn to capture vast envelopes of light gas?
Answer
Core formation must have been extremely efficient, potentially completing within just a few million years
For Jupiter and Saturn to become gas giants, they needed to accrete massive rocky/icy cores rapidly enough to capture gas before the Sun's intense solar wind blew that gas away.
Related Questions
What is the leading scientific explanation for the formation of our solar system?Who proposed one of the earliest documented proposals concerning the solar system originating from a rotating nebula of particles?What external event is widely believed to have triggered the initial compression and collapse of the stable solar nebula?Due to the conservation of which physical principle did the collapsing nebula flatten into a rotating disk instead of falling entirely into the center?What is the structure called that is formed when the collapsing cloud flattens into a vast, rotating disk containing raw material for planets?What formed at the hot, dense heart of the developing system, destined to eventually ignite nuclear fusion?What is the term used to describe the gradual process where microscopic solid particles collide and stick together in the disk?What is the specific name for the boundary beyond which temperatures were low enough for water and other volatile compounds to freeze into solid ice grains?What role do modern simulations incorporate magnetic fields for, which was absent in the initial Kant-Laplace formulation?What crucial constraint on outer planet formation is implied by the need for Jupiter and Saturn to capture vast envelopes of light gas?