:quality(75)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/elcomercio/S3GNNNZELZGHBO5KL7M67REUSY.png)
In a star system 1,300 light-years distant from Earth, researchers at UNLV (University of Nevada, Las Vegas) may have identified the first known planet to orbit three stars.
Unlike our solar system, which consists of a lone star, half of all star systems, such as GW Ori, where astronomers observed the novel phenomenon, are believed to consist of two or more stars that are gravitationally bound to each other.
Using observations from the powerful Atacama Large Millimeter / submillimeter Array (ALMA) telescope, UNLV astronomers analyzed the three dust rings observed around the three stars, which are critical for planet formation. But they found a substantial, if puzzling, gap in the disk’s circumference.
The team investigated different origins, including the possibility that the gap was created by the gravitational torque of the three stars. But after building a full GW Ori model, they found that the most likely and fascinating explanation for disk space is
Jeremy Smallwood, lead author and UNLV Ph.D. in Astronomy, said in a statement, “Inside a star system. Terrestrial planets such as Earth and Mars follow.
The planet itself cannot be seen, but the finding, highlighted in a September study in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, suggests that this e More observations from the ALMA telescope are expected in the coming months, which could provide direct evidence. of the phenomenon.
“It’s really exciting because it makes the theory of planet formation really solid.” dijo Smallwood. “It could mean that planet formation is much more active than we think, which is pretty good.”
Follow us on twitter:
.
