I If a planet struck the sun, would fragments be blasted out?

[Edward Barrow]

<Moderator's note: Yellow press link and headline deleted.>

Scientists have theorized that a planet (or planets) may have collided with our sun in the solar systems past:

Abstract
The Kepler mission results indicate that systems of tightly packed inner planets (STIPs) are present around of order 5% of FGK field stars (whose median age is ~5 Gyr). We propose that STIPs initially surrounded nearly all such stars, and those observed are the final survivors of a process in which long-term metastability eventually ceases and the systems proceed to collisional consolidation or destruction, losing roughly equal fractions of systems every decade in time. In this context, we also propose that our solar system initially contained additional large planets interior to the current orbit of Venus, which survived in a metastable dynamical configuration for 1%–10% of the solar system's age. Long-term gravitational perturbations caused the system orbits to cross, leading to a cataclysmic event that left Mercury as the sole surviving relic.

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/1...6ECB6D366F9222691BE05AFF1B592E.ip-10-40-2-119

Some of these proposed planets could have been gas giants which were orbiting very close to our sun, as can be seen in other star systems:

Considering this, is it possible that if such a planet did enter our sun in the solar systems past, that the resultant blast from the sun sent fragments of this planet hurtling outwards?

And that some of these fragments could be what formed the asteroid belt, the kuiper belt and even ETNOs?

Comets colliding with the sun are capable of producing an outburst from the sun (see 25 seconds in on this VIDEO), so why not planets.

Mehran Moalem, Engineer and Professor of Physics at UC Berkeley wrote an interesting piece here where he theorized on what would happen if a gas giant (similar to Jupiter) entered the sun. I'd imagine that while such an event would vaporize much of any planet that entered the sun, it should also blast some fragments outwards into the solar system.

 

[Ophiolite]

It seems reasonable to expect ejection of a portion of any colliding planet. However, the gross and isotopic chemistry of the fragments would be unlikely to match the specific, observed composition of objects in the asteroid belt or Edgeworth-Keuper belt.

 

[Bandersnatch]

Unlike @Ophiolite I don't see how this could happen in principle. There are two main issues I can think of:
1. The Sun is not a solid body, so any 'colliding' object should undergo gradual evaporation from the surface down as it plunges into the high-temperature environment. Unless it's a rogue planet, it would happen slowly over many orbits. There's just little reason for a planet to explode in here. Without a solid surface to send fragments away, there would have to be some pressure build-up in the centre that is then explosively released. But the heating is from outside-in, so I don't know how this could happen.
(btw: The shockwaves seen after the comet collides in that linked video are, I'm pretty sure, not cometary fragments, but momentary change in solar wind intensity after the passage of the colliding body disrupts the semi-regular bubbling patterns in its surface.)
2. The orbital mechanics are such that even if the process of heating up produced any large-scale fragments, they'd be on either elliptical or hyperbolic orbits. Meaning, they'd either return back to the point where they were ejected (to be burned up after all), or leave the solar system. It's difficult to imagine a sensible process of capturing such fragments into new orbits, in large numbers.

As a side note: your second linked article is not about collisions with the Sun, but between planets.

 

[Edward Barrow]

The orbital mechanics are such that even if the process of heating up produced any large-scale fragments, they'd be on either elliptical or hyperbolic orbits. Meaning, they'd either return back to the point where they were ejected (to be burned up after all), or leave the solar system. It's difficult to imagine a sensible process of capturing such fragments into new orbits, in large numbers.

Blasted out fragments would be affected by the gravity of the solar system planets as they were flung out from the sun. This would create a situation where some of them could be sent into elliptical orbits around the sun with a perihelion well outside the sun. Such a blast out from the sun might explain the odd pattern we find ETNOs arranged into:

...which some have blamed on a hypothetical planet nine.

 

[rootone]

Well yes, the Sun and the solar system is the result of long dead earlier stars.

 

[Bandersnatch]

Blasted out fragments would be affected by the gravity of the solar system planets as they were flung out from the sun.

I don't see how this could happen. Apart from the unlikely case of extremely close encounters, such interactions take a long time, over many orbits. And the supposed fragments wouldn't have the benefit of such a long time, as they're either leaving the system or returning to the Sun to be further burned up. You'd have to show this is possible mathematically, otherwise you're just handwaving the whole issue with 'and here magic happens'.

 

[berkeman]

Thread closed for Moderation...

 

[berkeman]

Because of repeated personal theory posts, this thread will remain closed, and the OP has left the building. Thank you to everyone who tried to help the OP.