This million-year-old 'baby planet' is the youngest world scientists have ever discovered
Astronomers have confirmed a large exoplanet is forming in the cloud of debris around a young star. At less than a million years old, it's the youngest exoplanet found so far.
A baby exoplanet, the youngest ever discovered, has been found orbiting a star 450 light-years from Earth. Named Elias 2-24 b, this planetary infant is less than 1 million years old, making it roughly equivalent to a two- or three-day-old baby. This milestone was achieved by combining observations from three telescopes: the W. M. Keck Observatory, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, and the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope.
Until now, the youngest-known exoplanets were around 5 million years old. This discovery provides scientists with a rare opportunity to study the initial stages of planet formation, as our planet-formation models have struggled to explain the processes of the previous record holders.
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