Solar system orbits set a deadline on the universe's violent end

Phantom dark energy — with equation-of-state parameter w < −1 — causes the universe to expand so violently that it eventually tears apart all structure, from galaxy clusters down to atoms. As the Big Rip approaches, even gravitationally bound systems like planetary orbits begin to unravel, providing a local clock for the countdown. Using current solar system dynamics data, the authors place a lower bound of roughly 30 years on the time remaining before any such event. Crucially, they show that future precision measurements of solar system orbits would detect signs of an approaching Big Rip before any cosmological survey could.