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Astronomy Picture of the Day - WISPIT 2b: Exoplanet Carves Gap in Birth Disk
NASA ^ | 27 Aug, 2025 | Image Credit: ESO, VLT, SPHERE; Processing & Copyright: ESO, Richelle van Capelleveen (Leiden Obs.)

Posted on 08/27/2025 6:14:12 PM PDT by MtnClimber

Explanation: That yellow spot -- what is it? It's a young planet outside our Solar System. The featured image from the Very Large Telescope in Chile surprisingly captures a distant scene much like our own Solar System's birth, some 4.5 billion years ago. Although we can't look into the past and see Earth's formation directly, telescopes let us watch similar processes unfolding around distant stars. At the center of this frame lies a young Sun-like star, hidden behind a coronagraph that blocks its bright glare. Surrounding the star is a bright, dusty protoplanetary disk -- the raw material of planets. Gaps and concentric rings mark where a newborn world is gathering gas and dust under its gravity, clearing the way as it orbits the star. Although astronomers have imaged disk-embedded planets before, this is the first-ever observation of an exoplanet actively carving a gap within a disk -- the earliest direct glimpse of planetary sculpting in action.


TOPICS: Astronomy; Astronomy Picture of the Day; Science
KEYWORDS: apod; astronomy; nasa; science; xplanets

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For more detail go to the link and click on the image for a high definition image. You can then move the magnifying glass cursor then click to zoom in and click again to zoom out. When zoomed in you can scan by moving the side bars on the bottom and right side of the image.

1 posted on 08/27/2025 6:14:12 PM PDT by MtnClimber
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To: MtnClimber

2 posted on 08/27/2025 6:14:36 PM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of scenery, wildlife and climbing, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: 21stCenturion; 21twelve; 4everontheRight; A Navy Vet; A_perfect_lady; abb; AFB-XYZ; AFPhys; ...
Pinging the APOD list

🪐 🌟 🌌 🍔

3 posted on 08/27/2025 6:15:24 PM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of scenery, wildlife and climbing, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber
To the right and a little low.


4 posted on 08/27/2025 6:16:47 PM PDT by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is opinion or satire. Or both.)
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To: MtnClimber

God created everything.


5 posted on 08/27/2025 6:19:12 PM PDT by Ken Regis (I concur )
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To: MtnClimber

Amazing picture. When I was a kid, no one really knew how planets formed. There was a theory that the planets of our solar system were ripped out of the sun by the gravitational tug of a close-passing star. Today, we know that planets are common, and they form when they sweep away leftover material from the star’s debris disk, until they dominate their respective orbits (Nebular theory). We can see it happening with modern telescopes, but this is the best one I’ve seen so far.


6 posted on 08/27/2025 6:30:21 PM PDT by Telepathic Intruder
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To: MtnClimber

Awesome shot.


7 posted on 08/27/2025 6:35:32 PM PDT by HandyDandy (“Borders, language and culture.” Michael Savage)
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To: MtnClimber

That is amazing.


8 posted on 08/27/2025 6:37:20 PM PDT by telescope115 (Ad Astra, Ad Deum…)
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To: MtnClimber

Interesting!


9 posted on 08/27/2025 7:04:47 PM PDT by Huskrrrr (Alinsky, you magnificent Bastard, I read your book!)
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To: MtnClimber

That looks like the floater in my eye.


10 posted on 08/27/2025 7:14:24 PM PDT by MayflowerMadam (It's hard not to celebrate the fall of bad people. - Bongino)
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To: Ken Regis

He’s still workin’ it too.

(G-D is Light, so says the Good Book. Kinda Explains Everything.)


11 posted on 08/27/2025 8:43:59 PM PDT by epluribus_2 (!)
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To: annie laurie; Knitting A Conundrum; Viking2002; Ernest_at_the_Beach; Mmogamer; fragrant abuse; ...
WISPIT. You must Wispit. Wispit it good!
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Google news searches: exoplanet · exosolar · extrasolar ·
X-Planets

12 posted on 08/28/2025 8:42:37 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (NeverTrumpin' -- it's not just for DNC shills anymore -- oh, wait, yeah it is.)
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