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The research highlights how different systems form
New images captured by the Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile reveal unique insights into planet formation around young stars. In these portraits, emerging planetary systems look more like miniature galaxies rather than discs of debris. The figures showcase clearly defined spiral arms arising from thick dust. Others exhibit less defined clouds of luminescent matter. For astronomers, these observations present a unique opportunity to study how planets are born. The collection of images, captured by one of the world’s most powerful telescopes, is one of the largest of its kind, framing more than 80 young stars and their planet-forming discs. “This is really a shift in our field of study,” said Christian Ginski, a lecturer at the University of Galway in Ireland. “We’ve gone from the intense study of individual star systems to this huge overview of entire star-forming regions.”
The young stars and their fledgling planets come from three major star-forming regions in the Milky Way galaxy. Some live in the Taurus or Chamaeleon I gas clouds, both of which are located some 600 light years from Earth, while others hail from the somewhat more distant Orion gas cloud about 1,600 light years away. The researchers found a wide variety of planet-forming discs that displayed significant differences based on which site they came from. In the Orion cloud, for instance, the astronomers observed groups of two or more stars surrounded by faint planet-forming discs. Some of the most massive stars in the region had oddly shaped discs, suggesting the presence of very large planets that distort their respective discs with their enormous gravitational pulls. “Some of these discs show huge spiral arms, presumably driven by the intricate ballet of orbiting planets,” Ginski said.
Others in the dataset feature rings and large cavities, most likely carved out by forming planets. Others still are smooth and seemingly inactive. More than 5,000 exoplanets – planets orbiting other stars than the Sun ��
