In a young, nearby solar system, scientists have discovered giant clouds of poison gas -- the smoking gun from a violent encounter, astronomers say. Based on massive amounts of carbon monoxide gas around the star Beta Pictoris, either two Mars-sized planets slammed into each other with catastrophic results, or hordes of comets are crashing into one another at an astounding rate.
The findings, published by the journal Science, could help provide an up-close look at how stars and their planetary systems form and evolve.
Beta Pictoris lies about 63 light years away and is only about 20 million years old, with a dusty disc of debris circling the star -- the remains that didn’t coalesce to form planets, moons, asteroids and other rocky objects. It has at least one planet, a gas giant that’s several times Jupiter’s mass and sits roughly nine times as far from its home star as Earth sits from our sun.
http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-beta-pictoris-star-planet-gas-collision-comets-carbon-monoxide-20140307,0,1884709.story#ixzz2vNyOkBQ6
No comments:
Post a Comment