It might seem like an eternity to us humans, but 300,000 years isn't that old in the cosmic scheme of things - at least to solar systems. Scientists have spotted the youngest still-forming solar system to date, and it looks like its in our own heavenly backyard.
L1527 IRS lies a mere 450 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Taurus. The young star in the dust and gas cloud is currently around one-fifth the mass of the sun, but scientists predict that as it grows it will eventually equal the mass of our sun. The dust and gas cloud contains enough material to make seven Jupiters. The solar system is only 300,000 years old, compared to our solar system's age of 4.6 billion years.
"This very young object has all the elements of a solar system in the making," said John Tobin, of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory. "This is the youngest protostar found thus far to show that characteristic in a surrounding disk. In many ways, this system looks much like we think our own Solar System looked when it was very young."
The scientists measured the Doppler shift of radio waves from the carbon monoxide in the disk and realized the young star system was incredibly similar to our own solar system. In essence, the rotation speed of the dust and gas disk changed in relation to the star just like our own solar system.
Hsin-Fang Chiang from the University of Illinois and the Institute for Astronomy of the University of Hawaii explains the similarities:
This phenomenon, known as a Keplerian rotation, "marks one of the first essential steps toward forming planets, because the disk is supported by its own rotation, will mediate the flow of material onto the protostar and allow the planet formation process to begin."
The scientists have gained approval to utilize Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array to further study L1527 IRS.
Read the published study online in the journal Nature.
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