First Photo of Planet in the Making

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Researchers Capture First Photo of Planet in the Making

UA scientists developed instruments and techniques that made imaging possible of a planet residing in a gap in LkCa15's disk.

There are 450 light-years between Earth and LkCa15, a young star with a transition disk around it, a cosmic whirling dervish, a birthplace for planets.

Despite the disk’s considerable distance from Earth and its gaseous, dusty atmosphere, University of Arizona researchers captured the first photo of a planet in the making, a planet residing in a gap in LkCa15’s disk.

Of the roughly 2,000 known exoplanets — planets that orbit a star other than our sun — only about 10 have been imaged, and that was long after they had formed, not when they were in the making.

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[Mark One]

That is cool!