For year centuries it was believed that the only existing bodies orbiting our sun where the ones that currently exist. In 2011 scientists proposed the possible existence of a fifth giant planet at the formation of the solar system. Since then it was thought that either Jupiter or Saturn was responsible for the missing planet. Astrophysicists at the University of Toronto have recently discovered that the ejection of the fifth gas giant was most likely produced by a gravitational interaction with Jupiter, having the fifth gas giant's velocity surpass the one necessary to escape the Sun's gravitational force.
To find the culprit researchers created simulations of interactions between Jupiter, Callisto (one of Jupiter's moons), and the missing planet. They compared this to interactions between Saturn, Iapetus ( one of Saturn's moons, and the missing planet. It was determined that Callisto could return to its orbit around Jupiter while Iapetus could not. Ryan Cloutier, PhD candidate at University of Toronto's Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics described Iapetus' hypothetical trajectory as "excessively unsettled" if the missing planet had been ejected by Saturn.
More information on this fifth giant can be found at the
Wikipedia article,
earthsky.org, or
phys.org.
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