How many stars are there in the solar system? In the social networks and other segments of the Runet that have gained so much popularity today, you can often find a similar question / survey. As a rule, it is accompanied by comments about narrow-minded compatriots who fundamentally do not understand the structure of our cosmic home. Indeed, how many stars are there in the solar system? What a stupid question? Here is a problem about how many stars are in our galaxy, it would be both more difficult and quite reasonably posed. But not everything is so simple! Going deeper into the matter,
you can come across some absolutely amazing things. It turns out that among modern scientists, the question of how many stars are in the solar system is quite serious. And now we are not talking about seekers of popular sensations and pseudoscientific theories about the origin of the world, alien visitations or world conspiracies, but about quite respected astrophysicists.
Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud
If not everyone, then certainly the vast majority of ordinary people know the planetary composition of our star system: the planets of the terrestrial group, separated from the rest by an asteroid belt, the gas giant Jupiter,ringed Saturn, distant Neptune, and so on. A much smaller number of people, if we are not talking about those who are specifically interested in this topic, are aware of the deprivation of Pluto's status as a planet. The fact is that already in the 2000s, bodies were discovered outside of its orbit that were not inferior to Pluto in size. For the first time since ancient Greece, astronomers faced the question: "What, in fact, is it right to call a planet?"
As a result of the generally accepted consensus and the adoption of a number of criteria, Pluto was designated a dwarf planet, like the newly discovered Eris, Sedna and others. These objects are numerous and constantly open the eyes of scientists to more and more new bodies. They are concentrated twice as far from the Sun as the orbit of Neptune, and are called the Kuiper Belt. However, the subsequent study of comets constantly flying into the solar system convinced astronomers that their source is not the Kuiper belt at all. According to modern ideas, thousands of times further away, at a distance of about one light year, there is another disk of concentration of solid celestial bodies. It is his perturbation that leads to the periodic invasion of comets into the inner radius of the solar system, their literal bombardment of planets like Saturn, Mars and the Earth. Presumably, the objects in the Oort cloud were once formed near the Sun long ago, but later scattered deep into space, now rotating in a distant orbit. But what is causing the perturbations of these bodies and causing them to periodically move back to the Sun?
Nemesis
And here the question of how many stars are in the solar system becomes not mocking, but quite serious. In the mid-80s, paleontologists Jack Sepkosky and David Raup declared the idea that life on Earth, very likely, was subjected to mass extinction with an enviable frequency - in 26-30 thousand years. However, the causes of these extinctions, paleontologists could not
install. Based on this, theories began to be born about the extraterrestrial origin of catastrophes, or rather, meteorite. A number of scientists to this day suggest that the Sun may have a twin star, which is a dim red dwarf (because no one has noticed it yet) and disturbs the Oort cloud at the indicated frequency, which leads to cosmic bombardment of the Earth and the destruction of all life. The hypothetical red dwarf has been named Nemesis. In fairness, it should be noted that the assumption of a real-life Nemesis is increasingly weakening these days. This is facilitated by the lack of success in its search, and the lack of proof of periodic bombardment, and finally, the skepticism about the version of such a constant extinction of living species on Earth. On the other hand, most famous stars do have partners. For example, our nearest galactic neighbor is the double star system Alpha and Proxima Centauri. And how old the stars are, how much they revolve around a common center of gravity.
