Astronomers Have Spotted The Birth Of Planets For The First Time

 

For the first time ever, scientists have been able to detect the formation of a planetary 

system. A research paper, published in Nature, proposes that the detected objects are newly 

born planets, which are currently put together by tremendously hot gas and dust. By means of

the system images captured between 2009 and 2015, the group of astronomers was able to 

detect two protoplanets - small objects that continue to form planets - together with a 

third potential, in orbit around a LkCa 15 star in an elliptical orbit, as expected by the 

planets.

Image Credit: Artist's Illustration of Planets Developing in a Transition Disc like LkCa 15.

The planets within the disc clearing collect material that would otherwise have fallen on 

the star, NASA / JPL-Caltech

Identifying the formation of planets is a rather difficult task. Newborn star systems are 

generally shielded in a cloud of dust that blocks our view, making normal observation 

methods inadequate. As a result, the team of astronomers had to come up with a different 

method for studying the system. Newly formed stars produce large discs of material from 

which planets are formed. As developing planets move over this protoplanetary disk, they 

generate gaps in swirling debris, which astronomers can locate using infrared light. 

Numerous protoplanet candidates have been identified in this way. For this recent discovery,

the team gathered infrared observations from the large binocular telescope, with 

alpha-hydrogen examination by the Magellan Telescope.

The gap around the parent star LkCa 15 was first detected in 2011, which showed the 

potential for the star to have at least one exoplanet. For this new study, astronomers 

were able to detect the hot gas (9,700 ° C [17,500 ° F]) that sinks to the nearest planet 

LkCa 15b. By examining the data from the system, astronomers realized that there were other 

discharges in the gap: a signal was recognized as a second planet after being observed 

numerous times. A third discharge should be another planet but it has yet to be confirmed.

This discovery and the success of this method offer new opportunities to study how planetary

systems are formed and how new planets connect with the disc of material around the star.