A Massive Planet May Have Disappeared Inside the Sun
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Did the Sun swallow a super-Earth billions of years ago? New research suggests that our young Sun may have engulfed a massive rocky planet several times the mass of Earth — and evidence of that lost planet could still survive inside the Sun today. Our solar system is strangely missing one of the most common types of planets found around other stars: the super-Earth. Now scientists are investigating whether one may actually have formed here, migrated inward, and eventually plunged into the Sun during the chaotic early history of the solar system. Using detailed solar evolution models and helioseismology, researchers found that planetary engulfment could help explain several unusual features of the Sun, including its internal sound-speed structure, convection zone and unusually low lithium abundance. The simulations point toward the young Sun potentially swallowing several Earth masses of rocky planetary material. But scientists have not discovered an intact planet inside the Sun. Instea
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