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About five billion years ago the solar system consisted of a sun condensing out of interstellar hydrogen and other debris orbiting that protostar (nuclear fusion had not yet begun) in a vast spinning disk of material. As material in the disk collided, friction caused it to slow and clump. Eventually eight bodies swept up most of the debris within their orbits. These eight bodies became the planets we know and love today. Earth formed in much the same way as the other inner planets, with the solar wind blowing much of the lighter gases out to the orbit of Jupiter and beyond.

Where the asteroid belt is, between Mars and Jupiter, there was insufficient mass for any planet to form.

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Jolie Roob

Lvl 10
3y ago

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