The Solar SystemComets |
From where do comets originate? |
Most of the comets that orbit the Sun originate in the Kuiper Belt or the Oort Cloud, two major zones in our solar system beyond the orbit of Neptune. “Short-period comets” usually originate in the Kuiper Belt. Some comets and comet-like objects, however, have even smaller orbits; they may have once come from the Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud, but have had their orbital paths altered by gravitational interactions with Jupiter and the other planets.