protoplanetary disks
A Second Generation of Planets can Form Around a Dying Star
When young stars coalesce out of a cloud of molecular hydrogen, a disk of leftover material called a protoplanetary disk…
Astronomers See Carbon-Rich Nebulae Where Planets are Forming
Understanding the birth of a planet is a challenging puzzle. We know that planets form inside clouds of gas and…
The Strange, Misshapen Orbits of Planet-Forming Disks in a Triple-Star System
Whatever we grow up with, we think of as normal. Our single solitary yellow star seems normal to us, with…
More Pictures of Planet-Forming Disks Around Young Stars
Astronomy is advancing to the point where we can see planets forming around young stars. This was an unthinkable development…
Habitability of Planets Will Depend on Their Interiors
A lot of the headlines and discussion around the habitability of exoplanets is focused on their proximity to their star…
Bizarre Double Star System Flipped its Planetary Disk on its Side
An international research team recently found a binary star system with a debris disk that orbits around their poles.
Here are 20 Protoplanetary Disks, With Newly Forming Planets Carving Out Gaps in the Gas and Dust
A new survey by an ALMA collaboration has resulted in stunning images of 20 nearby protoplanetary disks, which shows the…
Chaotic Wombs May Birth Wrong-way Planets
We’ve heard it time and time again. When it comes to new exoplanet findings, our conventional wisdom never holds. So…
ALMA Observes Binary Star System with Wacky Disks
When it comes to exoplanets, we’ve discovered an array of extremes — alien worlds that seem more like science fiction…
Catching Planets in the Womb
[/caption]Awhile ago I wrote on the difficulty of finding young planets. There, I mentioned one team announcing the potential discovery…