File this under "Hey, that's kinda cool": astronomers have found the least massive disk ever around a star. This press release is nifty, but has a major d'oh! moment for me. Read on.
Stars form in different ways, but the final birth pangs are roughly the same for everyone. A flattened disk of material forms from a collapsing cloud of gas and dust. The center heats up as more material piles on, eventually reaching high enough temperatures and densities to ignite nuclear fusion. A star is born. The disk of material around the star can form planets. The types of planets that form vary depending on the type of star, whether it's a binary star, how fast the big planets form, what the material is in the disk, and about a hundred other things. A few years ago this was conjecture, but now it's a solid fact: we see these ...
