--Posted By johannes to <http://www.monochrom.at/english/2008/09/interstellar-slowball-could-have.htm>monochrom at 9/04/2008 02:58:00 PM
Previous studies into whether material could travel between solar
systems predicted that such an exchange would be unlikely, because
the speed matter would need to be travelling at to escape one star
would mean it was moving too fast to be caught by another. Now Edward
Belbruno and colleagues at Princeton University have shown that
planetary systems in young, densely packed star clusters could throw
out rocks at a slower pace. They showed that for rocks in certain
orbital positions, the gravitational pull of the central star is
equal to the pull of other stars in the cluster. This sends the rocks
into chaotic orbits that eventually allow them to wander off at about
0.1 kilometres per second - slow enough for other stars to catch them.
<http://space.newscientist.com/article/mg19926725.400-interstellar-slowball-could-have-carried-seeds-of-life.html?DCMP=ILC-hmts&nsref=news2_head_mg19926725.400>Link
