Ruobing Dong

In 2022, the Subaru telescope photographed a point of light 100 astronomical units from the star AB Aurigae. The point was named planet AB Aur b, but debates did not subside: what exactly is glowing, the planet itself or dust around it?

Around the young star MWC 480, a flat disk of gas and dust whirls, like a giant carousel where, instead of horses, you have building blocks for planets. Radio telescopes peered into this disk at different wavelengths, from millimeter to centimeter, and saw exactly where the dust accumulates and how large the grains are.

Around young stars, flat clouds of gas and dust swirl — the building material for future planets. Starlight reflects off these clouds, and astronomers see them as faint disks. But sometimes bright spots or dark bands appear in such disks. Fresh observations with the Subaru Telescope show these patterns can change within a matter of months.

Edge of the spotlight. Remove the dazzling light of the central star, and a theater of shadows emerges. The James Webb coronagraph, like a dense curtain, hid the star TW Hydrae — and on a stage 120 astronomical units long (four times the distance to Neptune), its protoplanetary disk came alive.