Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

TL;DR

This study models meatball cloud formation in planetary atmospheres, finding it feasible for sustaining human caloric needs but not reaching the sizes depicted in the fictional work.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed microphysical modeling of meatball clouds, bridging speculative fiction and scientific plausibility.

Findings

Meatball condensation is possible in temperate atmospheres.

Meatballs do not grow to the sizes predicted by the fiction.

Such clouds could sustain humanity calorically on large planets.

Abstract

Speculative fiction has long served an inspiration for genuine scientific inquiry. One notable work that has almost acted in this manner is the the seminal comedic speculative fiction work Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. While exoplaneteers reference this work frequently, we have never engaged with the central prediction of this work... until now! We perform detailed microphysical modeling of meatball clouds, both bare and coated with marinara sauce, and find that while meatball condensation is possible in temperate atmospheres, the meatballs do not quite grow to the sizes predicted by Cloudy. We do find, however, that such meatball condensation, across a large enough planet, would be able to sustain humanity calorically.