Scientists managed to capture the birth of the planet for the first time

Astronomers of the European Southern Observatory managed to take a clear picture of the formation of a young planet in the constellation Centaur for the first time. The frame was taken on a "Very Large Telescope" (Very Large Telescope).

The image shows a young planet (a luminous spot) at the stage of laying its path through the so-called disk of matter around the young star PDS 70. The celestial body is located at a distance of 370 light-years from Earth.

Miriam Keppler, the head of the study and an astronomer from the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, said: "These disks around a young star are the birthplaces of planets, but so far it has been possible to film something resembling the birth of a planet only a few times."

Source: Mashable

Scientists filtered the brightness from the planet's star using a coronagraph. Keppler also explained that they had long suspected that a young planet was being born near this dwarf star. They confirmed their guesses with the help of SPHERE, a "Very Large telescope" instrument for searching for planets, which continuously photographs a star for several hours and then, using complex algorithms, identifies objects surrounding the star. "Sphere" also gave information about the atmosphere of the young planet.

This is a gas giant that is several times heavier than Jupiter. On the surface, the temperature is one thousand degrees Celsius. The process of planet formation will take about 120 years, which confirms the theory that gas giants like Jupiter form farther from their stars than rocky planets such as Earth.

More than a thousand planets outside the Solar System have been discovered since the 1990s, but astronomers have never been able to witness the formation of new ones. Now they will be able to find more newborn planets across the Galaxy.