Webb telescope spots infant planets in different stages of development
An artist's rendition of the sun-like star YSES-1 in the center, with the planet YSES-1 b and its dusty circumplanetary disk (right) and the planet YSES-1 c with silicate clouds in its atmosphere (left), is seen in this handout image obtained by Reuters on June 11, 2025. Ellis Bogat/Handout via REUTERS/Illustration
WASHINGTON - The James Webb Space Telescope has observed two large planets at different stages of infancy - one with an atmosphere brimming with dusty clouds and the other encircled by a disk of material - orbiting a young sun-like star in a discovery that illustrates the complex nature of how planetary systems develop.
The two gas giant planets, both more massive than our solar system's largest planet Jupiter, were directly imaged by Webb in a planetary system located in the Milky Way galaxy about 310 light years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Musca. A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, 5.9 trillion miles (9.5 trillion km).
Astronomers have detected more than 5,900 planets beyond our solar system - called exoplanets - since the 1990s, with less than 2% of these directly imaged like these two. It is rare to find exoplanets in their early developmental stages.
The birth of a planetary system begins with a large cloud of gas and dust - called a molecular cloud - that collapses under its own gravity to form a central star. Leftover material spinning around the star in what is called a protoplanetary disk forms planets.
This planetary system was observed by Webb very early in its developmental history. The star, named YSES-1, is about the same mass as the sun. The two planets orbit a long distance from the star, each probably needing thousands of years to complete a single orbit.
While the sun is roughly 4.5 billion years old, this star is approximately 16 million years old, a veritable newborn. The researchers were surprised to find that the two neonatal planets observed by Webb appeared to be at different stages of development.
The innermost of the two has a mass about 14 times greater than Jupiter and orbits the star at a distance 160 times greater than Earth orbits the sun and more than five times as far as our solar system's outermost planet Neptune.
The planet is surrounded by a disk of small-grained dust, a state one might expect in a very early stage of formation when it is still coalescing, or perhaps if there has been a collision of some kind or a moon is in the process of taking shape. Webb spotted water and carbon monoxide in its atmosphere.
The outermost planet has a mass about six times greater than that of Jupiter and orbits the star at 320 times the distance of Earth to the sun. Its atmosphere is loaded with silicate clouds, differing from our solar system's gas giants. Webb also detected methane, water, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. It has no disk of material around it.
The puzzling combination of traits presented by these two planets in the same system illustrates "the complex landscape that is planet formation and shows how much we truly don't know about how planetary systems came to be, including our own," said astrophysicist Kielan Hoch of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, who led the study published this week in the journal Nature.
"Theoretically, the planets should be forming around the same time, as planet formation happens fairly quickly, within about one million years," Hoch said.
A real mystery is the location where the planets formed, Hoch added, noting that their orbital distance from the host star is greater than would be expected if they formed in the protoplanetary disk.
"Furthermore, why one planet still retains material around it and one has distinct silicate clouds remains a big question. Do we expect all giant planets to form the same way and look the same if they formed in the same environment? These are questions we have been investigating for ages to place the formation of our own solar system into context," Hoch said.
In addition to amassing a trove of discoveries about the early universe since becoming operational in 2022, Webb has made a major contribution to the study of exoplanets with its observations at near- and mid-infrared wavelengths.
"Webb is revealing all sorts of atmospheric physics and chemistry happening in exoplanets that we didn't know before, and is currently challenging every atmospheric model we used pre-Webb," Hoch said. — Reuters
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
GMA Network
2 days ago
- GMA Network
Webb telescope spots infant planets in different stages of development
An artist's rendition of the sun-like star YSES-1 in the center, with the planet YSES-1 b and its dusty circumplanetary disk (right) and the planet YSES-1 c with silicate clouds in its atmosphere (left), is seen in this handout image obtained by Reuters on June 11, 2025. Ellis Bogat/Handout via REUTERS/Illustration WASHINGTON - The James Webb Space Telescope has observed two large planets at different stages of infancy - one with an atmosphere brimming with dusty clouds and the other encircled by a disk of material - orbiting a young sun-like star in a discovery that illustrates the complex nature of how planetary systems develop. The two gas giant planets, both more massive than our solar system's largest planet Jupiter, were directly imaged by Webb in a planetary system located in the Milky Way galaxy about 310 light years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Musca. A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, 5.9 trillion miles (9.5 trillion km). Astronomers have detected more than 5,900 planets beyond our solar system - called exoplanets - since the 1990s, with less than 2% of these directly imaged like these two. It is rare to find exoplanets in their early developmental stages. The birth of a planetary system begins with a large cloud of gas and dust - called a molecular cloud - that collapses under its own gravity to form a central star. Leftover material spinning around the star in what is called a protoplanetary disk forms planets. This planetary system was observed by Webb very early in its developmental history. The star, named YSES-1, is about the same mass as the sun. The two planets orbit a long distance from the star, each probably needing thousands of years to complete a single orbit. While the sun is roughly 4.5 billion years old, this star is approximately 16 million years old, a veritable newborn. The researchers were surprised to find that the two neonatal planets observed by Webb appeared to be at different stages of development. The innermost of the two has a mass about 14 times greater than Jupiter and orbits the star at a distance 160 times greater than Earth orbits the sun and more than five times as far as our solar system's outermost planet Neptune. The planet is surrounded by a disk of small-grained dust, a state one might expect in a very early stage of formation when it is still coalescing, or perhaps if there has been a collision of some kind or a moon is in the process of taking shape. Webb spotted water and carbon monoxide in its atmosphere. The outermost planet has a mass about six times greater than that of Jupiter and orbits the star at 320 times the distance of Earth to the sun. Its atmosphere is loaded with silicate clouds, differing from our solar system's gas giants. Webb also detected methane, water, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. It has no disk of material around it. The puzzling combination of traits presented by these two planets in the same system illustrates "the complex landscape that is planet formation and shows how much we truly don't know about how planetary systems came to be, including our own," said astrophysicist Kielan Hoch of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, who led the study published this week in the journal Nature. "Theoretically, the planets should be forming around the same time, as planet formation happens fairly quickly, within about one million years," Hoch said. A real mystery is the location where the planets formed, Hoch added, noting that their orbital distance from the host star is greater than would be expected if they formed in the protoplanetary disk. "Furthermore, why one planet still retains material around it and one has distinct silicate clouds remains a big question. Do we expect all giant planets to form the same way and look the same if they formed in the same environment? These are questions we have been investigating for ages to place the formation of our own solar system into context," Hoch said. In addition to amassing a trove of discoveries about the early universe since becoming operational in 2022, Webb has made a major contribution to the study of exoplanets with its observations at near- and mid-infrared wavelengths. "Webb is revealing all sorts of atmospheric physics and chemistry happening in exoplanets that we didn't know before, and is currently challenging every atmospheric model we used pre-Webb," Hoch said. — Reuters
GMA Network
5 days ago
- GMA Network
May 2025 was world's second-hottest on record, EU scientists say
A man sits on a tangle of branches in the Sacramento River while staying cool during a heat wave in Sacramento, California, US. May 30, 2025. REUTERS/Fred Greaves/File Photo BRUSSELS - The world experienced its second-warmest May since records began this year, a month in which climate change fueled a record-breaking heatwave in Greenland, scientists said on Wednesday. Last month was Earth's second-warmest May on record—exceeded only by May 2024—rounding out the northern hemisphere's second-hottest March-May spring on record, the EU's Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said in a monthly bulletin. Global surface temperatures last month averaged 1.4 degrees Celsius higher than in the 1850-1900 pre-industrial period, when humans began burning fossil fuels on an industrial scale, C3S said. That broke a run of extraordinary heat, in which 21 of the last 22 months had an average global temperature exceeding 1.5°C above pre-industrial times—although scientists warned this break was unlikely to last. "Whilst this may offer a brief respite for the planet, we do expect the 1.5°C threshold to be exceeded again in the near future due to the continued warming of the climate system," said C3S director Carlo Buontempo. The main cause of climate change is greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels. Last year was the planet's hottest on record. A separate study, published by the World Weather Attribution group of climate scientists on Wednesday, found that human-caused climate change made a record-breaking heatwave in Iceland and Greenland last month about 3°C hotter than it otherwise would have been, contributing to a huge additional melting of Greenland's ice sheet. "Even cold-climate countries are experiencing unprecedented temperatures," said Sarah Kew, study co-author and researcher at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute. The global threshold of 1.5°C is the limit of warming that countries vowed under the Paris climate agreement to try to prevent to avoid the worst consequences of warming. The world has not yet technically breached that target, which refers to an average global temperature of 1.5°C over decades. However, some scientists have said it can no longer realistically be met and have urged governments to cut CO2 emissions faster to limit the overshoot and the fueling of extreme weather. C3S's records go back to 1940 and are cross-checked with global temperature records going back to 1850. —Reuters
GMA Network
06-06-2025
- GMA Network
Japan's ispace fails again: Resilience lander crashes on moon
A model of the lunar lander "Resilience", operated by 'ispace', is displayed at a venue where employees of 'ispace' monitored its attempted landing on the Moon, in Tokyo, Japan, June 6, 2025. REUTERS/ Manami Yamada TOKYO, Japan - Japanese company ispace 9348.T said its uncrewed moon lander likely crashed onto the lunar surface during its touchdown attempt on Friday, marking another failure two years after an unsuccessful inaugural mission. Tokyo-based ispace had hoped to join U.S. firms Intuitive Machines LUNR.O and Firefly Aerospace in making successful commercial moon landings amid a global race that includes state-run lunar missions from China and India. Although the failure means another multi-year pause in Japan's commercial access to the moon, the country remains committed to the U.S.-led Artemis program and a wide range of Japanese companies are studying lunar exploration as a business frontier. Resilience, ispace's second lunar lander, had problems measuring its distance to the surface and could not slow its descent fast enough, the company said, adding it has not been able to communicate with Resilience after a likely hard landing. "Truly diverse scenarios were possible, including issues with the propulsion system, software or hardware, especially with sensors," ispace Chief Technology Officer Ryo Ujiie told a press conference. A room of more than 500 ispace employees, shareholders, sponsors and government officials abruptly grew silent when flight data was lost less than two minutes before the scheduled touchdown time during a public viewing event at mission partner Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp in the wee hours in Tokyo. Shares of ispace were untraded, overwhelmed by sell orders, and looked set to close at the daily limit-low, which would mark a 29% fall. As of the close of Thursday, ispace had a market capitalisation of more than 110 billion yen ($766 million). "We're not facing any immediate financial deterioration or distress because of the event," CFO Jumpei Nozaki said in the press conference, citing recurring investor support. In 2023, ispace's first lander crashed into the moon's surface due to inaccurate recognition of its altitude. Software remedies have been implemented, while the hardware design was mostly unchanged in Resilience. $16 Million payload Resilience was carrying a four-wheeled rover built by ispace's Luxembourg subsidiary and five external payloads worth a total of $16 million, including scientific instruments from Japanese firms and a Taiwanese university. The lander had targeted Mare Frigoris, a basaltic plain about 900 km (560 miles) from the moon's north pole. If the landing had been successful, the 2.3-metre-high lander and the rover would have begun 14 days of planned exploration activities, including capturing of regolith, the moon's fine-grained surface material, on a contract with U.S. space agency NASA. Resilience in January shared a SpaceX rocket launch with Firefly's Blue Ghost lander, which took a faster trajectory to the moon and touched down successfully in March. Intuitive Machines, which last year marked the world's first commercial lunar touchdown, also landed its second Athena lander in March, although in a toppled position just as with its first mission. Japan last year became the world's fifth country to achieve a soft lunar landing after the former Soviet Union, the United States, China and India, when the national Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency achieved the touchdown of its SLIM lander. The government last year signed an agreement with NASA to include Japanese astronauts in Artemis lunar missions and has supported private companies' research projects for future lunar development, assuming ispace's transportation capabilities. "Expectations for ispace have not faded," Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said in an X post. Although ispace will likely remain Japan's most advanced lunar transportation company, some Japanese firms may start to consider transport options from foreign entities to test their lunar exploration visions, said Ritsumeikan University professor Kazuto Saiki, who was involved in the SLIM mission. For its third mission in 2027, ispace's U.S. unit is building a bigger lander as part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services for the Artemis program. The company projects six more missions in the U.S. and Japan through 2029. "NASA increasingly needs private companies to improve cost efficiency for key missions with limited budgets," ispace CEO Takeshi Hakamada said, referring to U.S. President Donald Trump's proposed budget cuts. "To meet NASA's expectations, we'll support our U.S. subsidiary to keep up with development and play a role." ($1 = 143.5600 yen) — Reuters
