The best image yet of the birth of a solar system
The new ground-based telescope ALMA has taken an amazing image of a baby star and the planet-forming accretion disk that surrounds it.
ALMA uncovered never-before-seen features in this system, including multiple concentric rings separated by clearly defined gaps. These structures suggest that planet formation is already well underway around this remarkably young star. “These features are almost certainly the result of young planet-like bodies that are being formed in the disk. This is surprising since HL Tau is no more than a million years old and such young stars are not expected to have large planetary bodies capable of producing the structures we see in this image,” said ALMA Deputy Director Stuartt Corder.
ALMA has just been completed and is only in its initial shake-out period. It is also not an optical telescope, but observes in longer wavelengths above infrared. Thus, it can peer through dust clouds to see details like this. And these details confirm that the most accepted theory of planetary formation appears to be right.
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The new ground-based telescope ALMA has taken an amazing image of a baby star and the planet-forming accretion disk that surrounds it.
ALMA uncovered never-before-seen features in this system, including multiple concentric rings separated by clearly defined gaps. These structures suggest that planet formation is already well underway around this remarkably young star. “These features are almost certainly the result of young planet-like bodies that are being formed in the disk. This is surprising since HL Tau is no more than a million years old and such young stars are not expected to have large planetary bodies capable of producing the structures we see in this image,” said ALMA Deputy Director Stuartt Corder.
ALMA has just been completed and is only in its initial shake-out period. It is also not an optical telescope, but observes in longer wavelengths above infrared. Thus, it can peer through dust clouds to see details like this. And these details confirm that the most accepted theory of planetary formation appears to be right.
Readers!
Every February I run a fund-raising drive during my birthday month. This year I celebrate my 72nd birthday, and hope and plan to continue writing and posting on Behind the Black for as long as I am able.
I hope my readers will support this effort. As I did in my November fund-raising drive, I am offering autographed copies of my books for large donations. Donate $250 and you can have a choice of the hardback of either Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8 or Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space. Donate $200 and you can get an autographed paperback copy of either. IMPORTANT! If you donate enough to get a book, please email me separately to tell me which book you want and the address to mail it to.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Very interesting image. Some of the thinner rings appear to have a mottled appearance similar to the dust rings around Saturn associated with moonlets.
Useful information I didn’t is how large the disk is. Are these rings on the scale of the inner solar system, outer solar system or much larger?
This is awesome! I wonder if any of the gaps are in what will eventually be the “Goldilocks” zone?
With gravity as the driver behind the accretion models, I find this a rather large pill to swallow. This is probably a lack of understanding on my part, but in trying to imagine the actual mechanics of this clumping and merging I fear I’m coming up short.