Astronomers from Heidelberg discover planet in a dusty disk around a newborn star
Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg have discovered the youngest known extrasolar planet. Its host star is still surrounded by the disk of gas and dust from which it was only recently born. This discovery allows scientists to draw important conclusions about the timing of planet formation.
How do planetary systems form? How common are they? What is their architecture? How many habitable earth-like planets exist in the Milky Way? In the past decade, astronomers have clearly come closer to finding answers to these exciting questions. With the discovery of the first planet orbiting another Sun-like star in 1995, the field of extrasolar planet research was born.
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| ©Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
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| The newly discovered giant planet orbits around its young and active host star inside the inner hole of a dusty circumstellar disk (artist view).
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Comment: Let's do something fun. Here's a true/false question.
Are cell phones...
1. Harmful to children
2. Sources of traffic delays
3. Causes of traffic accidents
4. Not really necessary since we've managed without them for ages
5. A reason to put up a cellular infrastructure for potentially nefarious uses
The answer will be revealed when your children get older.