A Baby Picture of the Sun

Obviously there’s no way to see what our Sun looked like when it was still forming billions of years ago, but you can do the next best thing. Find a newly forming star with very similar mass and chemical constituents, and see how it’s starting out.

Astronomers have identified a newly forming star in the nearby Eagle nebula (that’s the nebula where the famous Pillars of Creation can be found) located about 7,000 light years from Earth. The object – dubbed E42 – is at the earliest stage of formation for a sunlike star that astronomers have ever found.

Our Sun was thought to form in a nebula very similar to the Eagle Nebula. The cloud of gas and dust collapsed about 5 billion years ago through ultraviolet pressure from nearby stars, as well as passing shockwaves from nearby supernova explosions.

So let’s sit back, and watch this baby star for another 5 billions years or so. They grow up so fast.

Original Source: University of Colorado at Boulder News Release