Oort Cloud - Hypothesis

Hypothesis

In 1932, Estonian astronomer Ernst Öpik postulated that long-period comets originated in an orbiting cloud at the outermost edge of the Solar System. In 1950, the idea was independently revived by Dutch astronomer Jan Hendrik Oort as a means to resolve a paradox: over the course of the Solar System's existence, the orbits of comets are unstable; eventually, dynamics dictate that a comet must either collide with the Sun or a planet, or else be ejected from the Solar System by planetary perturbations. Moreover, their volatile composition means that as they repeatedly approach the Sun, radiation gradually boils the volatiles off until the comet splits or develops an insulating crust that prevents further outgassing. Thus, reasoned Oort, a comet could not have formed while in its current orbit, and must have been held in an outer reservoir for almost all of its existence.

There are two main classes of comet, short-period comets (also called ecliptic comets) and long-period comets (also called nearly isotropic comets). Ecliptic comets have relatively small orbits, below 10 AU, and follow the ecliptic plane, the same plane in which the planets lie. Nearly all isotropic comets have very large orbits, on the order of thousands of AU, and appear from every corner of the sky. Oort noted that there was a peak in numbers of nearly isotropic comets with aphelia—their farthest distance from the Sun—of roughly 20,000 AU, which suggested a reservoir at that distance with a spherical, isotropic distribution. Those relatively rare comets with orbits of about 10,000 AU have probably gone through one or more orbits through the Solar System and have had their orbits drawn inward by the gravity of the planets.