Scientists have discovered the oldest known planet-forming disk - a 45 million-year-old ring of gas and dust that orbits around a young star, from which planets can form as the material collides and aggregates. Led by Steven Silverberg of the University of Oklahoma, the team described a newly identified red dwarf star with a warm circumstellar disk, of the kind associated with young planetary systems. "This particular red dwarf is a candidate member of the Carina stellar association, which would make it around 45 million years old. It's the oldest red dwarf system with a disk we've seen in one of these associations," he said. The discovery relied on citizen scientists from Disk Detective, a project designed to find new circumstellar disks.

Source: dna October 23, 2016 04:07 UTC