An international team of astronomers have snapped a gorgeous view of an icy ring of debris in a young and nearby star system . The spectacular body structure is the likely answer of exocomet collisions , 2 billion kilometers ( 1.2 billion international nautical mile ) wide and 20 billion kilometers ( 12.4 billion miles ) from its star Fomalhaut .
The find , published in two papers in theAstrophysical Journal , was only possible thanks to the Atacama Large Millimeter / submillimeter Array ( ALMA ) . Fomalhaut is the brightest champion in the constellation Piscis .
“ ALMA has given us this enormously clear image of a fully formed debris disk , ” Meredith MacGregor , one of the lead generator from the Harvard - Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge , enjoin in astatement . “ We can in the end see the well - delineate shape of the disk , which may tell us a outstanding deal about the underlying planetary system creditworthy for its extremely distinctive appearance . ”
Fomalhaut is located 25 light - years away and it ’s an incredibly immature arrangement , estimated to have formed 440 million years ago . It is also one of the first targets that ALMA looked atin 2012while still under construction . While the observations showed part of the band and the challenging debris disk , only now have astronomers been able to fully outline the property of the organization .
By construct a electronic computer model based on the data , astronomers were able to show that the disk might be influenced by planet within the system . There ’s at least one major planet orbiting Fomalhaut and more might be beyond our detection limit . ALMA ’s observations will help astronomers understand what these planets might be made of .
“ These datum tolerate us to square off that the relative abundance of carbon monoxide plus carbon paper dioxide around Fomalhaut is about the same as find in comets in our own solar system , ” say Luca Matrà of the University of Cambridge , UK , and precede author on the team’ssecond newspaper . “ This chemic relationship may indicate a similarity in comet organization conditions between the tabu reaches of this planetary organisation and our own . ”
By keep an eye on in exquisite contingent younger and younger stellar systems , ALMA is pushing the gasbag on what we can detect .
“ Twenty long time ago , the best millimetre - wavelength telescope gave the first bleary function of backbone grain orbiting Fomalhaut . Now with ALMA ’s full capabilities the intact ring of textile has been imaged , ” Fomalhaut Principal investigator Paul Kalas , from the University of California at Berkeley , add together . “ One day we hope to detect the planets that act upon the orbital cavity of these grains . ”
