The animation shows progressive growth over 4550 million years (Myr) of the lead isotope ratios for two stony meteorites (Nuevo Laredo and Forest City) from initial lead isotope ratios matching those of the Canyon Diablo iron meteorite. Lead isotope isochron that Clair Patterson used to determine the age of the solar system and Earth (Patterson, C., 1956, Age of meteorites and the earth: Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 10: 230-237). How does the Sun affect our climate answer. Dating meteorites thus allows us to give a lower age to the Solar System (4,56 billion years old). Graphic of the Sun with the words How Old Is The Sun answer. Meteorites, which are the very components of our planets (through the process of accretion), are the remnants of the Solar System’s origins. The Solar System was formed around 4.6 billion years ago, out of the collapse of a dense cloud composed of dusts and gases. For our modern understanding of how the planets in our solar system revolve around the sun, we must thank the Renaissance astronomer and Catholic cleric Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543), who first proposed a predictive mathematical model now known as heliocentrism, Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), who furthered the theory by predicting elliptical. These ages are very consistent because the meteorites had to form before the accretion of our planet, and the Earth had to cool down before the first minerals could crystallise. The oldest meteorites ever dated in the Solar System are 4,56 billion years old, the oldest minerals on Earth are 4,4 billion years old, and the oldest rocks on Earth are 4 billion years old. The precise decay rate of radioactive elements is used as a clock: the number of daughter products in one rock indicates its age. This age has been determined with the radioactive dating technique.