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Astronomers are excited about this one.
Using an extensive astronomical array in the high Chilean desert, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), scientists found enormous volumes of water around a young, developing planet. Solar system (technically still in its “protoplanetary disk” phase). The star HL Tauri is located 450 light years away. space. However, in the disk around HL Tauri, the powerful observatory was able to detect at least three times the amount of water contained in LandThe oceans.
“It is really surprising that we can not only detect, but also capture detailed images and spatially resolve water vapor at a distance of 450 light years from us,” said Leonardo Testi, an astronomer at the University of Bologna who worked on the observation. in a sentence.
But that is not all.
In the inner disk of material churning around the young star is a visible gap, an indication of where a planet might be forming. That’s where the water is.
Crushable speed of light
“I had never imagined that we could capture an image of oceans of water vapor in the same region where a planet is probably forming,” explained Stefano Facchini, an astronomer at the University of Milan who led the research. The research was recently published in the scientific journal. Nature Astronomy.
“I had never imagined that we could capture an image of oceans of water vapor in the same region where a planet is probably forming.”
In the image below, the blue colored regions show where water molecules exist. The red areas are rings of dust orbiting the star (HL Tauri) that looks like ours. sun (when I was much younger).
The ALMA telescope array, located at 5,058 meters (16,597 feet) in the deeply dry Atacama, is a collection of 66 telescopes working in unison to effectively create an expanding radio telescope. Radio waveswhich are a type of energy or light produced naturally by objects throughout the cosmos (such as visible light or X-rays), are captured by ALMA’s large antennas.
Water in the inner disk around the developing star HL Tauri.
Credit: ALMA (ESO / NAOJ / NRAO) / S. Facchini et al.
The dust-filled region of space, in the constellation of Taurus, where the developing star HL Tauri is located.
Credit: ESO/Digitized Sky Survey 2
Over the next few million years, a likely forming planet may incorporate this water as the molecules freeze into dust particles, which can accumulate into larger objects that form. planets.
It is too early to say whether a water world may one day exist around the star HL Tauri. But astronomers have found evidence of planets covered in oceans in the cosmos. And it is possible that water worlds and moons, such as Enceladus and Europa in our solar system, are common objects in our Milky Way.
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