A team of astronomers has achieved a breakthrough in observing planetary formation by directly tracking the rotation of a ...

Simulation of a planet embedded in a protoplanetary disc, causing disc material to pile up in a ring exterior to its orbit – Credit: Amena Faruqi / University of Warwick ...

Still from a simulation of a forming planetary disk. The images show the rotating inner disk along the top half, and the shadow it casts on the outer disk in the lower half. CREDIT Rebecca Nealon / ...

This photo shows the upper part of the water tornado model. The acrylic glas tank has a diameter of 50 centimetres and is illuminated with LED strips. The water forms a vortex whose surface shape ...

ALMA has spotted ring and spiral structures in protoplanetary disks just 300,000 or so years old. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

Stars and their planets form when large molecular clouds collapse in on themselves. Gravity pulls the dust and gas into a violent spiral, which flattens out into a structure known as a protoplanetary ...