Colonization of the outer Solar System Colonization of the outer Solar System Many parts of the outer Solar System have been considered for possible future colonization. Most of the larger moons of the outer planets contain water ice, liquid water, and organic compounds that might be useful for sustaining human life. Colonies in the outer Solar System could also serve as centers for long-term investigation of the planet and the other moons. In particular, robotic devices could be controlled by humans without the very long time delays incurred in communicating with Earth. There have also been proposals to place robotic aerostats in the upper atmospheres of
Planet Nine the disk had a distant inner edge, 100–200 AU, a planet encountering Neptune would have a 20% chance of being captured in an orbit similar to that proposed for Planet Nine. The observed clustering is more likely if the inner edge is at 200 AU. Unlike the gas nebula the planetesimal disk is likely to be long lived, potentially allowing a later capture. Planet Nine could have been captured from beyond the Solar System during a close encounter between the Sun and another star in its birth cluster. Three-body interactions during these encounters can perturb the path of planets on