Why this planet of 5.4 million years is still a baby

Astronomers come to capture a unique image of a new-born alien world – which has been growing in a nursery of dust and gas for over 5 million years.

So, why is this planet considered a baby? Astronomers say that is because the star, called PDS 70, is only 5 or 6 million years old. And compared to their normal lifespan of several billion years – our sun is about 4.5 billion years old – this makes the gas giant planet a baby. As such, this baby has not yet reached its adult size.

Astronomers captured the infamous baby on the internet using the SPHERE planet hunting instrument on the Very Large Telescope of the Southern European Observatory. ; our Sun, for example, is about 4.5 billion years old.

With SPHERE (acronym for Spectro-Polarimetric High-Contrast Exoplanet Research), astronomers were able to see young "traits" in the star system of the young planet. Specifically, the researchers saw the disk of gas and dust, which consists of remnants of the time when the parent star of PDS 70b was forming. [9 Most Intriguing Earth-Like Planets]

Starsand planets tend to form in clouds of dust and gas, and as the star ages, dust and gas dissipate. This is likely due to several reasons. First, growing planets absorb much of the remaining dust and gas as they grow and grow over time. In addition, a constant stream of particles emanating from the star (known as the solar wind) probably blows some of the material. But scientists are eager to study more systems of young stars to confirm these assumptions and learn more about planet formation. "Until now, several thousands of planets around other stars have been discovered, but astronomers still know very little, because most of the planets observed revolve around mature stars or Miriam Keppler and Andre Müller, both members of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Germany, wrote in an email sent to Live Science, each of whom wrote an article about the discovery that will be published in an upcoming issue of the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics

Usually the disc of gas and dust disappears when a star is about 10 million years old, they said. for which the twilight abode of this planet remains, the researchers said that they were not sure yet, but they added that they hope to study the planet with different telescopes to learn more about its c omposition, weather and other properties; "To better understand how planets are formed, and finally to learn more about the beginnings of our own solar system, we need to detect young planets, like PDS 70b." According to observations, astronomers have discovered that the planet had a temperature of about 1832 degrees Fahrenheit (1000 degrees Celsius), which makes the gaseous giant toasted too much for life at that time. (That said, it is very common for young planets be so hot, so the 70b PDS will probably cool as it ages.)

"It will probably be several million more years before the planet stops collecting the surrounding gases. ", added the astronomers." By here, it will increase just a little more en masse, when this process will stop, its temperature will decrease and the planet will cool down.The exact duration of these processes is part current research in astronomy. "

Life is probably not part of the future of the planet PDS 70b is a heavy planet, with a mass several times that of Jupiter, we have seen life only on Earth, which is small and rocky, and the planet is orbiting away from its parent sun, so PDS 70b will not get a lot of star heat after growing out of its baby and cooling stage. ( The best hope of life around the PDS 70b could come from a rocky exomoon that receives energy from the planet PDS 70b, but as astronomers have yet found none of these types of moons, it's hard to say.)

PDS 70b orbits about 2 billion millet es (3.2 billion kilometers) from its star, or at the same distance as Uranus from our sun. This makes the new planet a slow orbiter, taking about 120 Earth years to make a single turn around its star.

The next challenge will be for other planet astronomers like this baby planet, to learn more about the early days of solar systems look like. Perhaps then, scientists can better understand what makes a solar system friendly to life as we know it on Earth.

Originally published on Live Science.