“Deep space hurricanes” could point the way to alien worlds

Deep space “hurricanes” are a phenomenon closely observed by scientists and they take place when new planets form in distant solar systems.

When new planets form in distant solar systems, “hurricanes” and “vortexes” are generated in the surrounding dust that could lead astronomers directly to them.

And from there to other more complex worlds.

The new worlds that can be found in space

The young stars are surrounded by chaos: clouds of gas, dust and ice swirl in a protoplanetary disk. And when gravity brings this material together, planets are born.

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, researchers have developed a new technique for measuring and dating exoplanets incipients forming in these protoplanetary disks.

By studying the “little hurricanes” within protoplanetary disks that are visible in the ALMA data, astronomers can speculate about the exoplanets that caused these eddies to form.

interplanetary hurricanes

In most cases, scientists can use powerful telescopes to observe the dimming of stars, which indicates that an exoplanet is transiting or passing between Earth and the star.

Now this research group studies young exoplanets that are far from their stars, and these planets cannot be seen clearly with traditional techniques.

“It is extremely difficult to study smaller planets that are very far from their star by direct imaging.: It would be like trying to spot a firefly in front of a lighthouse,” says Roman Rafikov, a professor at Cambridge University and the Institute for Advanced Study, in a statement. “We need other, different methods to learn about these planets. “

The team’s new technique also uses an indirect form of observation to study exoplanets: Instead of looking for transits, they look for unusual formations, such as arcs or clusters, forming in the protoplanetary disk.

“Something has to cause these structures to form,” Rafikov explains in the statement.

“One of the possible mechanisms for producing these structures – and certainly the most intriguing – is that the dust particles we see as arcs and clumps are concentrated in the centers of the fluid vortices: essentially small hurricanes that can be triggered by particular instabilities at the edges of holes made by planets.”

The key to hurricanes in space is in the eddies

Study the properties of vortices, which require a certain amount of time and mass to formastronomers can estimate the age and mass of the exoplanet that created them.

“Our constraints can be combined with the limitations provided by other methods to improve our understanding of planetary characteristics and planet-forming pathways in these systems,” Rafikov said.

“By understanding planet formation in other star systems, we could learn more about how our own solar system evolved,” concluded the researcher.