Scientists have recorded for the first time how planets form around low-mass stars

Low-mass stars are usually quite faint, so their processes are difficult to observe even from powerful ones

However, a group of scientists from Germany managed to carry out similar work: they tracked six protoplanetary disks that surround thenewborn very low-mass stars recently discovered in the constellation Taurus.

All these stars formed in the last 2-3 millionyears old. Therefore, around them there are still flat disks of gas and dust, inside which, theoretically, planets can form. Astronomers tried to find them using the ALMA microwave telescope. They observed how dust particles move inside the disks and how their concentration differs.

According to the results, the authors found the work in threeprotoplanetary disks are characterized by rings and dips with a low density of dust and gas, which usually occur in the last stages of planet formation. According to scientists' calculations, some of them are comparable in size to Saturn or the small gas giants that astronomers discovered in the vicinity of larger stars.

We tested all alternative explanations for our observations, including the evaporation of dust by the light of these stars, but the existence of planetsremains the most plausible of them. 

Nikolaso Kurtowicz, scientist  at the Max Planck Astronomical Institute in Germany

At the moment, the authors of the work cannot say for sure the reason for the origin of these structures, but they sayNext, the group of scientists plans toContinue to observe such objects, understand how often planets form around red dwarfs

Read more:

Found a new kind of black hole that does not fit into the theory of relativity

Abortion and science: what will happen to the children who will give birth

Scientists have developed a replacement for the theory of relativity. What is the essence of the "theory of everything"?