How do interactions with outer planets influence the distribution of icy bodies in the Oort Cloud?

Outer planets like Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune pull on icy planetesimals that drift outward from the inner Solar System, giving them a big speed boost that can fling them far into space. When these bodies reach the distant Oort Cloud, the planets’ gravity has already changed their paths, so some are sent on very elongated orbits while others are left on tighter, more circular orbits. The strongest interactions come from Jupiter and Saturn because they are massive and close to the planetesimal belt, so they dominate the reshaping of the icy population. Over billions of years, this scattering process creates a halo of icy bodies that are loosely bound to the Sun and spread out in a roughly spherical shell. For example, a comet that once orbited the Sun at 10 astronomical units can be nudged by Jupiter’s gravity and end up in the Oort Cloud, hundreds of thousands of kilometers from the Sun, ready to be tugged back into the inner Solar System by a passing star.