The Risk of Stellar Flybys and GJ 710

We know stellar flybys occur because we've seen them in other Solar Systems like this one. This illustration shows the dusty circumstellar disk surrounding the young protostar UX Tauri A, which is being perturbed by a passing star. We also know that our Solar System has experienced them, and will experience more in the future. What risk do they pose? Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Caltech

In a stellar flyby, a star approaches our Solar System close enough to create gravitational mayhem. The last one was 70,000 years ago. There are more in the future, and it’s possible that they could disrupt comets from the Oort Cloud and send them into the inner Solar System, with the risk of catastrophic impact.

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