Earth Versus the Rings of Saturn
Simulates Earth as a Saturnian satellite just outside the F ring, ploughing through thousands of icy ring particles and raising wakes, gaps, and density waves.
Scenarios
What If
Hypothetical rearrangements of known worlds: a Moon falling into Earth, Europa as a second satellite, Jupiter and Saturn swapped, the Nice model’s five-planet start, Planet Nine among detached objects, and a red-dwarf flyby.
Earth with Europa as a Second Moon
Simulates Earth with two moons: our Moon plus Europa at 671,000 km (1.7 lunar distances), testing the tidal stability of a double-satellite Earth.
Earth–Moon System with Mimas as a Submoon
Simulates Mimas as a submoon of our Moon at 7,500 km — well inside the lunar Hill sphere — while the Earth–Moon pair continues its real path around the Sun.
Five-Planet Nice Model Initial Conditions
Simulates the five-planet Nice model: Jupiter, Saturn, and three ice giants in a compact resonance chain at 5.5–20 AU plus a planetesimal disk from 24 to 30 AU.
Forming Solar System with Twelve Protoplanets
Simulates twelve protoplanets between 1 and 10 AU around a Sun-like star, embedded in 400,000 debris particles — oligarchic growth with scattering, collisions, and accretion.
Four Rocky Planets, One Orbit
Simulates Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars forced onto one shared 1 AU circle, 90° apart, while the giant planets stay in their real 2025 orbits — a co-orbital stress test.
Giant Planet in a Debris Ring
Simulates a 300-Earth-mass giant at 5 AU inside a 200,000-particle debris ring from 4.5 to 5.5 AU, shepherding material to Lagrange points, collisions, or ejection.
Jupiter and Saturn Swapped
Simulates the Solar System with Jupiter at Saturn ’s distance and Saturn at Jupiter’s, using real 1 January 2025 sky positions — a swap that unbinds the giant-planet architecture.
Moon Thief Captures Earth's Moon
Simulates an Earth-mass rogue planet on a hyperbolic flyby that strips the Moon from Earth after one undisturbed lunar orbit in the real 1 January 2025 Solar System.
Planet Nine and the Detached Objects
Simulates hypothetical Planet Nine with Neptune and detached objects such as Sedna and 2012 VP113, testing whether a distant 5–10 Earth-mass body can shepherd their orbits.
Red Dwarf Flyby of the Solar System
Simulates a 0.12-solar-mass red dwarf on a hyperbolic flyby 40 AU from the Sun, with all eight planets and major dwarf planets in their January 2025 configuration.
The Limits of Earth's Sphere of Influence
Simulates ring particles at the edge of Earth’s sphere of influence (~925,000 km) versus an inner band at lunar distance, showing where solar gravity overtakes Earth’s.
The Moon Falls into Earth
Simulates the Moon starting just outside Earth with sub-orbital speed, so gravity pulls it in to overlap Earth’s sphere before a full merger in the real Sun–Earth system.
The Solar System with a Hot Jupiter
Simulates the real 1 January 2025 Solar System plus a Jupiter-mass planet on a 4-day, 0.05 AU orbit inside Mercury — a hot Jupiter our system never formed.
Triton Capture by Neptune
Simulates Agnor & Hamilton’s binary-exchange capture of Triton by Neptune: an equal-mass Triton binary on a close encounter that binds one member and ejects the other.
Twin Jupiters
Simulates two Jupiter-mass giants at 3 AU and 4 AU instead of one Jupiter, with the terrestrial planets and outer giants in their real 1 January 2025 positions.
Uranus at 2 AU
Simulates Uranus moved to 2 AU between Mars and Jupiter, with the other planets in their real 1 January 2025 positions — an ice giant dominating the middle Solar System.