In august 2012 legendary spacecraft Voyager 1 officially left the solar system followed by its
sister ship Voyager 2 on November 5th 2018 such a feat had never before been achieved by mankind
and proved to be a significant step forward but there is a mysterious field of icy bodies that
lies at the very edge of the solar system that we would inevitably have to cross if we ever
hope to leave the solar system and not even the voyager crafts are anywhere close to crossing it
welcome to fact nominal and today we're going to take a closer look at the mysterious orcs cloud
which marks the frontiers of our solar system to really understand the Oort Cloud and where
exactly it lies we must first answer these two questions how big is our solar system
and how far in space do you have to travel before you reach the end of our solar system
a good way to wrap your head around it would be to use the sun as a reference so where the sun's
gravitational force becomes negligible as compared to the influence from the stars in the milky way
somewhere between those extremes the objects that we can see and the edge of the sun's gravity
there lies the mighty Oort Cloud the peculiar name for this region of icy bodies comes from dutch
physicist and astronomer Jan Hendrick Oort who came up with a concept jan who is known for his
significant contributions in the understanding of the milky way overturning the idea that the
sun is at the center and most notably known for discovering invisible dark matter in 1932
made a number of insightful contributions in the study of comets while studying them he came to an
important conclusion that most of the comets come originally from a large resource of debris which
we now know as the Oort cloud the theological giant cloud with icy debris is thought to be
comprised of two regions a spherical outer Oort Cloud and the second a disk-shaped interword cloud
according to him the objects within this cloud are mostly made up of ice water ammonia and methane
this however is all in theory and there is no direct observation of the Oort Cloud but it may
very well be the birthplace of all the Halley-type comets that enter into the solar system
and would definitely answer a lot of questions we have even about Jupiter family comets the outer
part of the Oort Cloud on the other hand is only loosely bound to the solar system and is therefore
more easily affected by the gravitational pull from passing stars and the milky way
much that we know about the Oort Cloud is all theory but it may very well be true and according
to this theory this cloud of particles is said to be the remains of the disk of material that form
the sun and planets there are several theories out there which researchers and astronomers each
having their own idea of how and what caused this cloud formation at the die of the solar system
but one of the most likely theories is that the material that is now supposedly in the earth cloud
probably formed closer to the sun in the earliest years of the formation of the solar system
after the planets were formed some 4.6 billion years ago the region in which they were formed
still contains lots of leftover chunks called planetesimals formed from the same materials
as the planets in these early stages of the planetary formation specifically Jupiter as
the planets began to grow coalesce and migrate to their present position the gravitational influence
could have scattered millions upon millions of icy objects out into space and into their current
position in the Oort Cloud so in short the gravity from the planets were responsible for shoving
many icy planetesimals away from the sun which likely caused them to settle in the border and
outermost regions of the solar system where the planets can't really interfere with them anymore
and together those objects in the region comprising them are what is known as the
Oort cloud if this theory proves to be true the study of the Oort cloud and its many icy
objects could actually hold many key answers to the early formation of the solar system
of course the Oort cloud being at the edge of the solar system one can only imagine how
jaw-droppingly far away it is naturally using kilometers and miles wouldn't even be remotely
sufficient to measure how far this vein cloud is and so instead we use astronomical units or a
u that is the unit defined as the distance between the earth and the sun
to put that into perspective 1au would be roughly 93 million miles or 150 million kilometers
now consider little Pluto our lovely ex-planet and now dwarf planet whose elliptical orbit
carries it about 30 and 50 astronomical units from the sun which is pretty far away
but then you have the Oort Cloud with its inner edge sitting between 2000 and 5000 au away
from the sun and its outer edge a whopping ten thousand to one hundred thousand au from the sun
traveling to mars someday isn't sounding that far away when compared to the mighty Oort Cloud
now is it if that wasn't enough to convince you of how difficult it would be to reach the Oort Cloud
let's just say even our Voyager 1 and 2 spacecrafts are nowhere close
at its current speed of about a million miles a day nasa's voyager 1 won't enter the Oort
cloud for yet another 300 years and that is if it even makes it that long and if it does actually
manage to do so let's just say it would be a good 30,000 years before it's able to get out of there
the entire theory of the Oort cloud is based on the fact that Jan Oort theorized that it must
be the birthplace of long-period comets so if you're wondering what you'd see in the cloud it
would definitely be hundreds of billions or maybe even trillions of icy bodies since the objects in
the Oort cloud are theoretically made up of the same stuff that planets are made up of does that
mean they orbit or rotate too well unlike the Kuiper Belt Objects or the planets and the main
asteroid belts these objects don't necessarily travel in the same direction in a shared orbit
around the sun they seem to be making their own rules out there instead they can travel under
and over in various inclinations around the sun sort of like a thick bubble of icy debris if they
followed the same path as the others it would be called the Oort Belt as opposed to the Oort Cloud
in 2003 scientists actually discovered what they think might be the first object that they'd ever
found that could have originated from the Oort Cloud the object found beyond Neptune was given
the name Sedna and was particularly unique for how far away it always remained from the sun
not to mention that it's also extremely large some 1,000 kilometers in diameter
however that's all scientists were able to gather about it sadly unless NASA planned a mission in
2033 or 2046 time would eventually run out at a chance to study the possible Oort Cloud object
although the concept of the Oort Cloud seems so good the fact remains that the best ideas
and theories that we have about it are yet to be confirmed no one has ever seen the Oort Cloud and
our spacecrafts won't make it there for a few centuries unless by some stroke of luck we are
able to beat light speed travel soon enough to either prove or debunk the mystery surrounding
what exactly lies at the edge of the solar system another fascinating theory is that over time the
cloud could be depleting in environments such as globular clusters the persistence of the
Oort Cloud for billions of years seems nearly impossible its origin and full extent are yet
to be studied and discovered but if there is something that we can agree on is that it has
to comprise the same protoplanetary material as the other primordial bodies in our solar system
only with more advancements in technology better simulations and models will we ever know for
certain as our telescopes improve both in size and wavelength coverage scientists and astronomers
alike will no doubt be looking for whatever little hints they can find and as we do so we inch closer
and closer to getting the answers that we need but for now it remains a faint icy cloud of mystery
at the edge of the solar system that's all for today folks so what are your thoughts on the
Oort Cloud let us know in the comments don't forget to smash that like button and subscribe
to the channel so you don't miss a thing thanks for watching we'll see you next time