IBEX Captures ‘Alien’ Material From Beyond Our Solar System

















Artist impression of IBEX (NASA)




*Thanks to Dwayne Brown from NASA for the Spock reference.

10 Replies to “IBEX Captures ‘Alien’ Material From Beyond Our Solar System”

  1. “Either the solar system evolved in a separate, more oxygen-rich part of the galaxy than where we currently reside….”

    There are many cases of dwarf galaxies merging with much larger galaxies such as the Saggitarius Dwarf galaxy currently merging with the Milky Way.

    I wonder if it is ‘possible’ that the Sun was once part of a dwarf galaxy that merged with the Milky Way long ago.

    I imagine scientists have already disproved this.

    1. We might think of supernovae as various ovens which cook up elements at different temperatures and pressures. It is then compared to cooking something as different temperatures and coming up with a different result. So there are various regions in the galaxy with different nebular recipes, which stars pass through.


  2. may mean we’ve moved out of the region our solar system formed in or that particles are trapped ….OR that the act of forming a solar system changes the concentrations of free atoms by liberating or using them. Besides, our solar system didn’t form from tenuous interstellar gases. that would have taken longer than the universe has existed.

    1. The solar system is 4.5Gy old and ‘orbits’ S* every 250,000 years. Wouldn’t it, we, have “moved out” quite a long time ago?

      1. I have no idea what you just said there. I THINK you mean our solar system orbits the centre of our galaxy every 250,000 years. I don’t know what that has to do with anything. “Moved out” is in quotations but I guess you’re not quoting but just emphasizing. And why would we “move out” and are we our solar system? Or are you not really replying to my post at all?

  3. I must confess to be mystified by the discussion, the IBEX observations showing that the Sun is average composition while the Local Cloud is not, then putting it as if the solar system and not the cloud is the odd man out.

    I hope the journal has put up the papers now, maybe they will tell more. This of course goes back to the origin of the solar system, believed to have happened in a molecular cloud seeded and kickstarted by a supernova.


    It would certainly affect the biosphere, but astrophysical events up to and including supernovas doesn’t seem to have caused extinctions.

    Mass extinctions so far predicted more firmly, the K-Pg (Cretaceous-Paleogene) and the P-Tr (Permian-Triassic), are triggered or sustained by environmental factors, for K-Pg the Chixculub impactor and for P-Tr the Siberian Traps. However, in both cases the main factor were biosphere deposited sediments.

    Mutation rates are affected by the environment, but is also believed to be controlled by the populations to a variation rate that is competitive (I think). I’ll have to hunt up the reference, but I read the other week about how some cells (yeasts?) can make duplicates of genomes coping with stress and/or enhanced mutation rates as I remember it.

  4. Of course the sun has moved from where it formed! Nearby stars are all different ages and compositions (metallicities) so obviously over time everything gets jumbled up.

    Agree with Torbjörn that it seems unlikely that a change in the interstellar environment will affect much. You’d think reversals of Earth’s magnetic field would have a bigger effect on the cosmic ray flux and they happen all the time.

  5. 1AU->~90AU->Distance unknown->Distance & existence unknown
    The best scale ever.

    And a great article of course.

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