Dust Chronicles of Catastrophes: JWST Reveals Secrets of Planetary Smash-ups
Around some young stars where star formation has recently ended, there swirl not just dust rings but actual planetary battlefields — extreme debris disks.
A Furnace for Planets: The Outburst of PR Ori B
In the constellation Orion, in the cloud of gas and dust L1641, the young star PR Ori B suddenly flared up like a furnace that someone had thrown fuel into. Its brightness rose fivefold, and astronomers watched for the first time as a fuor was born, a rare event in which a star begins greedily swallowing material from the surrounding disk.