Asteroid Crashes Likely Gave Earth Its Water

Diggester writes "Asteroids from the inner solar system are the most likely source of the majority of Earth's water, a new study suggests. The results contradict prevailing theories, which hold that most of our planet's water originated in the outer solar system and was delivered by comets or asteroids that coalesced beyond Jupiter's orbit, then migrated inward."

Comments

Re:The moon

[tragedy]

The moon has lower gravity than earth and little or no atmosphere for all of its history. Any water on the surface of the moon would be expected to be stripped away by by the solar wind over millions of years, leaving only deposits in shielded locations. Some water would also be created on the moon from the solar wind as well. I think we should reasonably expect with those conditions and that amount of time that the concentrations of water on Earth and on the moon would be nothing alike.

Re:Sounds intelligently Designed

[dryeo]

Better yet, crash Ceres into Venus. A 9.43 ± 0.07×1020 kg mass crashing at 10 miles per second would probably blow most of the atmosphere off and Ceres is largely water.