PARIS: Astronomers have, for the first time, observed the earliest stage of planet formation around a distant star, offering fresh insight into how our own solar system may have begun. (Wednesday, July 16)

The planetary system is taking shape around HOPS 315, a young star located some 1,300 light years from Earth in the Orion Nebula. HOPS 315 is believed to resemble the Sun in its infancy.

PLANETS BORN FROM GAS AND DUST

Young stars are typically surrounded by vast rings of gas and dust known as protoplanetary discs, the breeding grounds for new planets. Within these discs, crystalline minerals containing silicon monoxide can clump together, eventually snowballing into kilometre-sized planetesimals. These can go on to become full-fledged planets.

In our own solar system, such minerals, the "starter dough" for planets like Earth and Jupiter, are believed to have been trapped inside ancient meteorites.

Now, researchers have found similar signs of early planet formation in the disc surrounding HOPS 315. The findings were published in the journal Nature.

MINERALS IDENTIFIED BY SPACE AND GROUND TELESCOPES

"For the first time, we have identified the earliest moment when planet formation is initiated around a star other than our Sun," said lead study author Melissa McClure of Leiden University in the Netherlands.

The James Webb Space Telescope first detected the presence of the minerals. Astronomers then used the European Southern Observatory’s ALMA telescope in Chile to pinpoint their location.

They found the crystalline minerals clustered in a narrow region of the disc, which bears similarities to the asteroid belt in our own solar system.

WINDOW INTO OUR COSMIC ORIGINS

This discovery could allow scientists to monitor a process that once shaped Earth and its neighbouring planets.

"We are seeing a system that looks like what our solar system looked like when it was just beginning to form," said study co-author Merel van 't Hoff of Purdue University in the United States.

Astronomers witness birth of solar system for first time