Science and Space

space and astronomy articles.

An asteroid belt found around a sunlike star

Scientists have for the first time found evidence for a massive asteroid belt around a mature, sunlike star, thanks to the Spitzer Space Telescope.

The star, dubbed HD69830, is some 41 light-years away—which, in space terms, is practically our own backyard.

Asteroids are the leftover building blocks of rocky planets like Earth. Scientists are interested in asteroid belts because they may mark either the construction sites that accompany the formation of rocky planets, the junkyards that remain after the formation of such planets, or simply places where, for one reason or another, material just couldn’t assemble to form planets at all. Asteroids occassionally collide with each other, raising cosmic dust. They also crash into planets and moons.

Of the 85 stars Spitzer scientists have examined to date, only HD69830 yielded evidence of an asteroid belt. It is thicker than the asteroid belt in our own solar system, which lies between Mars and Jupiter and packs nearly 25 times more debris.

Astronomers have previously detected other asteroid belts around two far younger, more massive suns. But researchers believe the latest discovery—an asteroid belt arrayed around a mature star—will reveal more about our sun and whether our solar system is the norm or the exception.

Scientists say they don’t know yet if any planets orbit HD69830.

posted by: kyawoo at 20:24 | link | comments |
unmanned missions, asteroids

Comments: