THE DEBRIEF - New stellar models predict that gas giant planets can act as ‘agents of chaos’ in their solar systems by wreaking havoc on the habitable zone orbits of Earthlike planets that may harbor alien lifeforms.
Our solar system’s gas giants, Jupiter and Saturn, help protect the inner rocky planets, including Earth, from potentially catastrophic meteor and cometary collisions. However, this new research seems to show that our little corner of the cosmos is the exception and that, in many cases, massive gas giants likely have the opposite effect on potentially habitable systems.
To determine if their theory was correct, the University of California, Riverside (UCR) researchers looked at actual exoplanet systems that contained gas giants. One candidate was a star system known as HD 141399. Approximately 121 light years away, which is practically next door in cosmic terms, this system contains four gas giants that orbit far from their host star. This is key, said researchers, as Jupiter and Saturn also orbit far from our sun, especially compared to Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars.