Artist’s impression of the discs around the young stars HK Tauri A and B

This artist’s impression shows a striking pair of wildly misaligned planet-forming gas discs around both the young stars in the binary system HK Tauri. ALMA observations of this system have provided the clearest picture ever of protoplanetary discs in a double star. The new result demonstrates one possible way to explain why so many exoplanets — unlike the planets in the Solar System — came to have strange, eccentric or inclined orbits.

Credit:

R. Hurt (NASA/JPL-Caltech/IPAC)

About the Image

Id:eso1423a
Type:Artwork
Release date:30 July 2014, 19:00
Related releases:eso1423
Size:4800 x 2700 px

About the Object

Name:HK Tauri
Type:Milky Way : Star : Grouping : Binary
Category:Illustrations

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