Earth Could Be Ejected Out Of The Solar System, Study Warns

Earth could be thrown off its orbit and flung into another planet or the Sun, a new study has warned. Passing stars could be the orchestrator of this cosmic instability which could jeopardise our planet's health, much before the Sun annihilates it in five billion years as a red giant.

Based on thousands of computer simulations, the study published in the journal Icarus, states that there is a chance that a passing field star -- a type of star that appears in the same region of the sky as another object being studied-- could cause more havoc than previously estimated.

A star with mass comparable to our Sun passing within 10,000 astronomical units could significantly disrupt the Oort Cloud, which marks the outer boundary of our solar system beyond Pluto.

"Passing stars are the most probable instability trigger during the next four billion years," the study highlighted, adding that planets in the solar system, as well as Pluto, were significantly less stable than previously thought.

“Our simulations indicate that isolated models of the solar system can underestimate the degree of our giant planets' future secular orbital changes by over an order of magnitude. In addition, our planets and Pluto are significantly less stable than previously thought,” Nathan Kaib and Sean Raymond, a pair of astronomers, wrote in May.

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The gravitational tug due to these stars could increase the risk of instability for Mercury by 50-80 per cent, and there is a five per cent chance of chaotic gravitational interactions for Pluto over five billion years.

“We also find an approximately 0.3 percent chance that Mars will be lost through collision or ejection and an approximately 0.2 percent probability that Earth will be involved in a planetary collision or ejected,” the researchers stated.

In the event of Mercury's orbit being changed by the passing star, the resulting chaos could cause Venus or Mars to crash into Earth. In other instances, Earth might crash into the Sun, or Venus and Mars might fling Earth towards Jupiter. Afterwards, the giant planet's gravity ejects Earth from the solar system.