The Theory of Stars and Planets Formation

It is a commonly accepted theory today that everything started with a Big Bang when out of a tiny singularity 13, 7 billion years ago the universe was born from a cosmic explosion of a subatomic ball of infinite density and enormous mass, thus holding hyper amount of energy. Over a period of time this newly created space, time and matter due to a released tremendous energy evolved into remarkably-designed and fully-functional stars, galaxies and planets, including our earth.

This explanation was put forward by Stephen Hawking who has worked on the basic laws applicable to our universe. With Roger Penrose he showed that Einstein's General Theory of Relativity implied space and time would have a beginning in the Big Bang and an end in black holes which can be doubted now taking into consideration the supposition (which almost borders on assurance) that black holes are strings or membranes between different constituencies of a matrix-type Universe. However his theoretical results indicated it was feasible to unify General Relativity with Quantum Theory, another great scientific achievement of the first half of the 20th century. In fact Hawkins and Penrose discovered that black holes should not be completely the emptiest void or totally black, but should emit some sort of radiation (Gamma and X-rays) and eventually evaporate and disappear. The latter is doubtful now based on the postulates of Karl Schwarzschild, the theory of Roy Kerr (the Kerr solution), the works of S. Chandrasekhar and the latest dramatic data produced by the teams of Saul Perlmutter and Andrea Ghez.

Another conjecture is that the universe has no edge or boundary in imaginary time and space which implies that the way our universe began was completely determined by the laws of science: the Newtonian physics and the Einstein relativity.

Therefore, due to the Big Bang ( the unique cosmologic reaction ) light was produced and escaped this indefinite singularity (where initially M (mass) = E (energy) and time and space were created (E=Mc2 where C is a speed of light equal to 300,000 km/sec). When we talk here about time and space as major dimensions of a visible existence we mean material called matter consisting of subatomic particles as constituting elements of our world. The most elementary of them is the Higgs particle which is as yet a hypothetical one invoked to explain why the carriers of the electroweak force (the W and Z bosons) have mass.

It is important to mention that all interactions/forces in nature (electromagnetism, weak, strong and gravity) are transmitted by particles called gauge bosons. For example electromagnetism is "carried" by photons which are particles of light (C).Thus, this idea was further developed to explain mass. And in 1966 Peter Higgs (University of Edinburgh) proposed that the universe was full of a field called a Higgs field. Disturbances in this field as particles move through it cause objects to have mass. From a quantum point of view, we can only stir up the field in discrete units. The smallest possible disturbance is due to Higgs particles which act like cosmic molasses that fill all of space. To sum up, Higgs particles are believed to be responsible for mass of objects in the universe. Thus, mass (M) and gravity (G) are major characteristics required to form matter for a cosmic construction.

After the release of light from a singularity in a form of a premondial fireball all kinds of chemical reactions became possible to produce gas as a major building block. It appears then that the major stages in a formation of stars and planets are as follows:

1. Formation of molecular clouds of gas (primarily hydrogen) within spiral galaxies with high gravitational instabilities;
2. Creation of a structural composition (nebula) within the gas clouds, due to "violent turbulence" (solar winds) and activity of stars;
3. Random turbulent processes lead to regions (self-gravitating blobs and star-forming cores) dense enough to collapse under their own weight;
4. Due to a rotation of a collapsing blob an asymmetric flat disk is formed, with growing "protostar" at the center;
5. Simultaneously bipolar outflows of cosmic gas and dust from a forming star/disk system are generated due to the charged torque moment;
6. Cosmic material is processed, moving in from the globule or blob to the disk. What is left as a result of this process builds up on the protorstar (not a real star yet );
7. After a fusion of the protostar, a real star is born. ;
8. The energy released from the collapse of the gas into a protostar causes its center to become extremely hot in order to initiate nuclear fusion which is a chemical reaction where two hydrogen atoms combine to form a helium atom, releasing energy. It is a very efficient process, releasing a gigantic amount of energy because a single helium atom contains less mass than two hydrogen atoms. The excess mass is released as energy. Thanks to the work of Albert Einstein, the equation E=Mc2 tells us exactly how much energy this reaction releases. Fusion will power the star for 90% of its lifetime.
9. As soon as the outflow ceases and the "accretion" phase that brings into the existence a new star terminates, some spare material is left around the star due to a hydrostatic equilibrium which is a phenomenon caused by the interaction between outside gravity and inner gas pressure;
10. By the end of the star-formation stage, the left-over material in the "circumstellar disk" (a.k.a. "protoplanetary disk") forms a variety of planets;
11. Eventually there are a new star, maybe some planets, and a disk of left-over ground-up solids, visible as a debris belt around stars other than the Sun, and known as the "Zodiacal Dust Disk" in our solar system. This disk is usually several billion kilometers in diameter

The latter consists of an average star we call the Sun as well as 8 or 10 planets which are Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto (a status of this formation as a dwarf planet was recently questioned by scientists as there are some evidence that it might be not) and Sedna (which was discovered a few years ago far away from the Sun and resembles a lot Pluto). It includes: the satellites or moons of the planets; numerous comets, asteroids and meteoroids; and the interplanetary medium. The Sun is the richest source of electromagnetic energy (mostly in the form of heat and light) in the solar system. Its nearest known stellar neighbor is a red dwarf star called Proxima Centauri, at a distance of 4.3 light years away. The whole solar system, together with the “local stars” orbits the center of our galaxy, a spiral flat disk of 200 billion stars called the Milky Way It has two small galaxies orbiting nearby named the Large Magellanic and the Small Magellanic Cloud. The nearest substantial galaxy is the Andromeda which is 4 times as massive and is 2,3 million light years away. They are on a collision course with each other. Our galaxy, one of 100 billion galaxies known, is traveling and transforming through intergalactic space as the Universe continues to expand.