Researchers claim that the Earth is equipped with its own defense system against asteroids. A recent study confirmed the old assumption about the existence of a mechanism to protect our planet. There is a possibility that Earth may have a system that could prevent collisions with asteroids that could cause global catastrophes and destroy civilization. A new study provides evidence of Earth’s gravitational pull manifesting as tidal forces strong enough to tear apart asteroids near Earth.

In the early 1990s, Jupiter’s tidal forces broke apart Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, causing smaller pieces to fall onto the planet. However, so far there is not enough evidence that asteroids passing by the Earth are destroyed by tidal effects.

Previous simulations had shown that near-Earth asteroids could be disrupted by tidal forces during close passes of the Solar System’s first four planets, but until recently there were no direct observations to support this theory. The study, published on the arXiv previous work server, provides evidence that near-Earth asteroids can be tidally destroyed when their orbits intersect with Earth and Venus.

A team from Sweden examined data collected by the Catalina Sky Survey, which included 90% of near-Earth asteroids larger than 140 meters over the past six years, and found asteroids that did not collide with Earth. These were mostly small asteroids that orbited in orbits nearly parallel to those of Earth and Venus. Scientists suggest that such “missed” asteroids may be broken pieces of large asteroids.

But while tidal destruction can deal with some asteroids that pose a threat to Earth, the process can produce smaller fragments. After tidal destruction, these fragments remain in orbits approaching Earth and may eventually collide with it.

“Fragments resulting from tidal destruction will remain in orbit around the planet for some time after the destruction. Some fragments may survive additional tidal destruction during subsequent approaches from the planet, and therefore the number of fragments may increase, and some may fall into the planet,” the researchers wrote in their paper. However, scientists add that these small asteroids do not pose a threat to life on Earth. Source