Astronomers spot stellar duo: Two planets share orbit around a sistant star!
A cloud of debris, possibly sharing orbit with one of the two exoplanets around star PDS 70
PTC News Desk: A team of astronomers has made an intriguing discovery, indicating the existence of two planets sharing the same orbit around a distant star. Using Chile's Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), they detected a cloud of debris that might either be the building blocks of a new planet or remnants of one that has already formed.
The young star PDS 70, located 400 light-years away, is known to host two Jupiter-like planets called PDS 70b and PDS 70c. While studying this star system with archival ALMA observations, the team identified a cloud of debris at the position in PDS 70b's orbit where Trojans, or co-orbital planets, are expected to exist.
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This finding could be groundbreaking, providing the strongest evidence yet that two exoplanets can share the same orbit around a host star. Co-orbital planets, or Trojan planets, are pairs of planets with similar masses that share the same orbit around their host star.
Our Solar System already has a similar example in the form of Trojan asteroids, more than 12,000 rocky bodies that orbit the Sun along with Jupiter.
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The research raises new questions about the formation and evolution of Trojan planets and their prevalence in different planetary systems. The study's co-author, Nuria Huelamo, a senior researcher at the Centre for Astrobiology, describes it as an important step in the search for co-orbital planets during their early formation.
To fully confirm their findings, the team will continue observing PDS 70b and its associated cloud of debris using ALMA until after 2026. If they can establish that both objects move significantly together in orbit around the star, it would represent a groundbreaking advancement in the field of exoplanetary research.
The future holds exciting possibilities as the extended capabilities of ALMA, planned for 2030, will significantly enhance our ability to study Trojan planets in many other stars, concludes Itziar De Gregorio-Monsalvo, ESO Head of the Office for Science in Chile and a contributor to the research.
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