Translations:Asteroids/8/en

Astronomers have also discovered a group of asteroids whose highly elliptical orbits take them at times among the inner planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars) that are nearer to the sun. There is still much speculation among scientists over the origin of these minor planets; the two main hypotheses are that asteroids are either fragments of a planet that exploded or was destroyed, or they are particles that never condensed to form a planet.