A Planet Changeing it's Orbit

[SquareHiccup]

Is it possible for a planet like earth orbiting another star to at one time have orbited in a very eliptical path and then somehow eventually settle into a more circular orbit? Perhaps via a giant collision or a number of smaller collisions with astroids? I know this question has a lot of unknows but I'm just wondering if something as massive as a planet can drastically change its orbit wiithough breaking apart or falling into the star or flying off into deep space (I'm not sure any of these other three options are possible either). Is it possible for an advanced alien race to alter its home planets orbit with technology?

[ydoaPs]

iirc, that is part of accepted stellar system evolution.

[SquareHiccup]

Would Earths orbit change if the moon's orbit were to change drasticly? If we were to find that our planet was quickly falling towards the sun, would a perfectly timed blast to the moon be enough to save the earth?

[[Tycho?]]

Would Earths orbit change if the moon's orbit were to change drasticly? If we were to find that our planet was quickly falling towards the sun, would a perfectly timed blast to the moon be enough to save the earth?

 

 

A large change in the moons orbit could affect earths orbit. Depends on what you mean by drastically though, since we are talking about very large scales here. If the moon was totally ejected from orbit around the earth I'd think that the earths orbit would be severely affected by that.

 

And its actually pretty difficult for a planet to fall quickly into the sun. Even a large orbital decay would take thousands of years for earth to hit the sun. If the earth was in such a state, the amount of energy required to correct our orbit would mind booggling, I dont know if changing the moon's orbit would be enough to correct it.

[g2006]

Hello all

I recently read that nasa have a plan to move the earths orbit in the event of the heat increse of i think when the sun starts to die, im afried i can not find the article but the brief of it is as mentioned above hit by a force strong enough to knock it out of its orbit. Im sure if someone googles this it should come up with a more informative article.

Hope this helps

[danny8522003]

I wouldnt have thought the gravity of the moon would be strong enough to prevent the Earth from colliding with the Sun. If you consider the mass of the Moon and that of the Sun, there is a big different meaning the gravitational force of the Moon would be negligible.

 

In my opinion, the moon leaving the Earths orbit would just result in a change in the Earth axil rotation and it's wobble, as well as the tides obviously...