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Science 19 November 2004:
Vol. 306. no. 5700, pp. 1302 - 1304
DOI: 10.1126/science.1099114
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Perspectives

PLANETARY SCIENCE:
How Neptune Pushed the Boundaries of Our Solar System

Alessandro Morbidelli

Model studies are providing increasing evidence that the orbit of the planet Neptune was originally much smaller than it is today. In his Perspective, Morbidelli explains the latest insights into how Neptune's migration may have pushed small objects at the primordial edge of the Solar System outward, creating the various components of the Kuiper belt (a population of small bodies at the outer edge of today's Solar System). The models also provide an explanation for Neptune's current orbit. It remains unclear, however, exactly when the migration took place.

The author is in the Observatoire De la Cote d'Azur, B.P. 4229, 06034 Nice Cedex 4, France. E-mail: morby{at}obs-nice.fr

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)