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What Is a Planet?

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Steven Soter1,2

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A planet is an end product of disk accretion around a primary star or substar. I quantify this definition by the degree to which a body dominates the other masses that share its orbital zone. Theoretical and observational measures of dynamical dominance reveal gaps of 4-5 orders of magnitude separating the eight planets of our solar system from the populations of asteroids and comets. The proposed definition dispenses with upper and lower mass limits for a planet. It reflects the tendency of disk evolution in a mature system to produce a small number of relatively large bodies (planets) in nonintersecting or resonant orbits, which prevents collisions between them.


Keywords

accretion, accretion disks; solar system: formation; solar system: general


Dates

Issue 6 (2006 December)

Received 2006 August 16, accepted for publication 2006 September 4

Published 2006 November 2



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