An international team of scientists, including Xander Tielens of Leiden Observatory, has used space telescope Hubble and the ALMA observatory to show that UV radiation from massive stars can prevent planets from forming. The researchers publish their findings on 1 March in the journal Science.
The team studied the Orion Nebula, a known nursery of stars. The astronomers found that a Jupiter-like planet-in-formation in protoplanetary disk d203-506 could not form because heavy stars in the Trapezium cluster nearby produce intense UV radiation. The UV radiation causes gas to be ejected from the protoplanetary disk. This leaves too little gas to form a planet.
The scientific article can be read on the website of Science.
This article appeared as a press release on the website of the Netherlands Research School for Astronomy (NOVA).
Image: NASA/STScI/Rice Univ./C.O'Dell et al (overview); O. Berné/I. Schroetter/PDRs4All (inset)
