Possible planets around SAO 206462 (Lupus)

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/possible-planets.html


"What we're finding is that once these systems reach ages of a few million years, their disks begin to show a wealth of structure -- rings, divots, gaps and now spiral features," said John Wisniewski, a collaborator at the University of Washington in Seattle. "Many of these structures could be caused by planets within the disks."

The newly imaged disk surrounds SAO 206462, an 8.7-magnitude star located about 456 light-years away in the constellation Lupus. Astronomers estimate that the system is only about 9 million years old. The gas-rich disk spans some 14 billion miles, which is more than twice the size of Pluto's orbit in our own solar system.

The Subaru near-infrared image reveals a pair of spiral features arcing along the outer disk. Theoretical models show that a single embedded planet may produce a spiral arm on each side of a disk. The structures around SAO 206462 do not form a matched pair, suggesting the presence of two unseen worlds, one for each arm.

Wow, that's a nice image!

Interesting. Though I would prefer to have more direct evidence of the planets.

What's the current score with predictions of planets from debris discs anyway? Beta Pictoris b seems to match the predictions pretty well, but I'm not sure anything else does. Fomalhaut initially looked like it might be another case but it doesn't seem to be matching expectations in follow-up observations...

SpaceRef: Spiral Structure of Disk May Reveal Planets

Image of the disc around the F8 star SAO 206462 reveals spiral structure.

Also http://arxiv.org/abs/1202.6139

Nothing new here other than what is reported here, right?

Looks like no.

Merge the threads!

Done