RZ Picseum tagged posts

This illustration shows a “disrupted planet” slowly broken up into a cloud of gas and dust as it orbits the star RZ Piscium about 550 light years from Earth. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/CI Lab

Astronomers have discovered that a distant star, RZ Picseum, 550 light years from Earth, in the constellation Pisces is crushing one or more planets into its orbit into a vast cloud of gas and dust. The discovery may shed light on a brief but volatile period in the history of many solar systems, including our own.

“We know it’s not uncommon for planets to migrate inward in young solar systems since we’ve found so many solar systems with ‘hot Jupiters’ – gaseous planets similar in size to Jupiter but orbiting very close to their stars,” said Pilachowski, who is the Daniel Kirkwood Chair...