Sun may have captured asteroids from afar

  • 02/12/2004

  • International Herald Tribune (Bangkok)

The Sun may have captured thousands or even millions of asteroids from another planetary system during an encounter more than four billion years ago, astronomers reported. Such an interstellar ballet would explain many mysteries of the outer solar system, including the strange behavior of the recently discovered Sedna, the system's most distant known object, which occupies a strange elongated orbit far beyond Pluto.