Tag Archive for 'Planet formation'

At an estimated mass of 5 Jupiter masses, NIRISS-NGC1333-5 (also known as NN5) is a good candidate to be the lowest-mass object found in NGC 1333 thus far and the lowest-mass object with a disk in any region identified to date. Image credit: Langeveld et al., doi: 10.3847/1538-3881/ad6f0c.

Webb Discovers Six Free-Floating Exoplanets in NGC 1333

Aug 27, 2024 by News Staff

Using the Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph (NIRISS) instrument on the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers have discovered...

An artist’s impression of a hot-Jupiter exoplanet. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Astronomers Discover New Cotton-Candy Exoplanet: WASP-193b

May 14, 2024 by News Staff

Gas giant exoplanets around bright nearby stars provide crucial insights into planetary system formation and evolution mechanisms. Most of these planets...

Planet-forming disks around young stars and their location within the gas-rich cloud of Taurus, roughly 600 light-years from Earth. In total, the scientists observed 43 stars in the Taurus region, all of which are pictured here (though planet-forming disks were only detected in 39 of these targets). Image credit: ESO / Garufi et al. / IRAS.

VLT Finds Protoplanetary Disks around 86 Young Stars

Mar 5, 2024 by News Staff

New observations of 86 planet-forming disks provide astronomers with a wealth of data and unique insights into how planets arise in different regions of...

An artist’s impression of the massive star-forming region, with the planet-forming disk XUE 1 in the foreground. Image credit: Maria Cristina Fortuna, www.mariacristinafortuna.com.

Webb Detects Various Molecules in Extremely Irradiated Protoplanetary Disk

Dec 1, 2023 by News Staff

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have detected abundant water, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, hydrogen cyanide and acetylene...

An artist’s impression of the giant exoplanet Kepler-1704b. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Neptune-Mass Exoplanet around Ultracool Dwarf Star Challenges Current Theories of Planet Formation

Nov 30, 2023 by Natali Anderson

Current theories predict that low-mass stars should rarely host planets with masses exceeding that of Neptune (17 Earth masses). An artist’s impression...

An artist’s impression of the five-planet system HD 108236. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Even in ‘Pristine’ Planetary Systems, Planets Exhibit Bit of Tilt

Nov 28, 2023 by News Staff

Astronomers have long puzzled over why all of the planets in our Solar System have slightly slanted orbits around the Sun. But Yale University planetary...

Rings of dust surrounding HL Tauri, with line patterns showing the orientation of polarized light. Image credit: NSF / AUI / NRAO / B. Saxton / Stephens et al.

ALMA Detects Dust Grains in Gaps of HL Tauri’s Protoplanetary Disk

Nov 21, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have captured a high-resolution image of HL Tauri, a young star in the constellation...

Jupiter-Like Exoplanets May Be More Common than Previously Found

Oct 18, 2023 by News Staff

Young moving stellar groups are the best targets for direct imaging of exoplanets and four massive Jupiter-like planets have been already discovered in...

Heavy elements dominate the mass of the Neptune-sized exoplanet TOI-1853b. Image credit: Luca Naponiello.

Supermassive Neptune-Sized Exoplanet Has Density Higher than Steel

Sep 4, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

Astronomers believe the peculiar composition of the Neptune-sized planet TOI-1853b is the result of a giant planetary clash. Heavy elements dominate the...

This composite image shows V960 Mon, a young star located over 5,000 light-years away in the constellation of Monoceros. Observations obtained using the Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet REsearch (SPHERE) instrument on ESO’s VLT, represented in yellow in this image, show that the dusty material orbiting V960 Mon is assembling together in a series of intricate spiral arms extending to distances greater than the entire Solar System. Meanwhile, the blue regions represent data obtained with ALMA. The ALMA data peers deeper into the structure of the spiral arms, revealing large dusty clumps that could contract and collapse to form giant planets roughly the size of Jupiter via a process known as gravitational instability. Image credit: ESO / ALMA / NAOJ / NRAO / Weber et al.

Astronomers See Signs of Planet Formation around V960 Mon

Jul 26, 2023 by News Staff

The formation of giant planets has traditionally been divided into two pathways: core accretion and gravitational instability. However, in recent years,...

This ALMA image shows the young planetary system PDS 70. The system features a star at its center, around which the planet PDS 70b (highlighted with a solid yellow circle) is orbiting. On the same orbit as PDS 70b, indicated by a solid yellow ellipse, Balsalobre-Ruza et al. detected a cloud of debris (circled by a yellow dotted line) that could be the building blocks of a new planet or the remnants of one already formed. The ring-like structure that dominates the image is a circumstellar disk of material, out of which planets are forming. There is in fact another planet in this system: PDS 70c, seen at 3 o’clock right next to the inner rim of the disk. Image credit: ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / Balsalobre-Ruza et al.

ALMA Detects Possible Trojan Protoplanet around PDS 70

Jul 20, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

PDS 70, a young K7-type star some 370 light-years away from Earth in the constellation of Centaurus, is a unique target for planetary formation studies...

Bonsor et al. present distinct observational evidence from white dwarf planetary systems for planetesimal formation occurring during the first few hundred thousand years after cloud collapse in exoplanetary systems. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Stars and Building Blocks of Their Planets ‘Grow Up’ Together, New Study Suggests

Nov 15, 2022 by News Staff

The timing and locations of formation of planetesimals — the building blocks of planets — are crucial to the understanding of planet formation....