the.com/planetesimal
a planet's rough draft, still figuring out if it wants to be somebody.
means a small solid body formed by clumping dust and rock in the early solar system, the building block that grows into planets.
from coined in the early 1900s by geologists chamberlin and moulton, who bolted -esimal (as in infinitesimal) onto planet to name the tiny things that precede the big ones.
size rangeanywhere from a boulder to hundreds of kilometers wide
gluegravity and static-like stickiness clump the dust
survivors todayasteroids and comets are leftover, unpromoted planetesimals
timelineformed within the solar system's first few million years