Jupiter – friend or foe? I: The asteroids
Jupiter – friend or foe? I: The asteroids
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木星——朋友还是敌人？我：小行星
DOI：
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发表时间：
2008
影响因子：
1.7
通讯作者：
B. Jones
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
J. Horner;B. Jones
摘要小行星是当今地球上潜在撞击物的主要来源。长期以来，人们一直认为巨大的木星充当了一个盾牌，大大降低了彗星和小行星对地球的撞击率。这种屏蔽，据称，使生命的发展和进化在碰撞环境中，这是不是过于敌对。撞击频率的降低，以及相关的大规模毁灭，将使生命有时间茁壮成长，否则它将被压制。然而，在过去，很少有工作已经进行了审查的有效性，这一想法。在几篇论文中的第一篇中，我们研究了巨行星的存在在多大程度上增加或减少了小行星代表性种群造成的撞击风险，试图充分了解地球上生命发展的撞击机制。我们的研究结果表明，情况远不如以前假设的那么明确，即巨行星的存在可以显著提高小行星对地球的撞击率。
Abstract The asteroids are a major source of potential impactors on the Earth today. It has long been assumed that the giant planet Jupiter acts as a shield, significantly lowering the impact rate on the Earth from both cometary and asteroidal bodies. Such shielding, it is claimed, enabled the development and evolution of life in a collisional environment, which is not overly hostile. The reduced frequency of impacts, and of related mass extinctions, would have allowed life the time to thrive, where it would otherwise have been suppressed. However, in the past, little work has been carried out to examine the validity of this idea. In the first of several papers, we examine the degree to which the impact risk resulting from a population representative of the asteroids is enhanced or reduced by the presence of a giant planet, in an attempt to understand fully the impact regime under which life on Earth developed. Our results show that the situation is far less clear cut that has previously been assumed, that is, the presence of a giant planet can act to enhance the impact rate of asteroids on the Earth significantly.