Astronomers have a problem on their hands: How can you make planets if you don’t have enough of the building blocks? Stars are born from colossal clouds of gas and dust and, in their earliest stages, are surrounded by a thin disk of material. Dust grains within this halo collide, sometimes sticking together. The clumps build up into planetary cores, which are big enough to gravitationally attract additional dust and gas, eventually forming planets. But many details about this process remain unknown, such as just how quickly planets arise from the disk, and how efficient they are in capturing material....
