In this research, the team used high performance computers to run three-dimensional simulations of a broken disc. From this shadow pattern, it can be inferred that the inner part of the disc is oriented completely differently to the outer part, in what is called a broken disc. Some of the discs seen by ALMA have shadows on them, where the part of the disc closest to the star blocks some of the stellar light and casts a shadow onto the outer part of the disc. However, recent telescope images from the Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array (ALMA) show that this is not always the case.
Protoplanetary discs are often thought to be shaped like dinner plates – thin, round and flat. This swirling mass of gas and dust is called a protoplanetary disc, and it’s where planets like the Earth are born. The leftover material that doesn’t make it into the star ends up circling around it, not unlike how water swirls around the drain before falling in. Stars are born when a large cloud of gas and dust collapses in on itself. Dr Rebecca Nealon presented the new work this week at the 2022 National Astronomy Meeting at the University of Warwick. The effect also gives clues as to how they might evolve with time. Grants for Studies in Astronomy and GeophysicsĪstronomers from the University of Warwick reveal a new phenomenon dubbed the “rocking shadow” effect that describes how discs in forming planetary systems are oriented, and how they move around their host star.GCSE Poster Competition 2022 – Sponsored by Winton.Geophysical Journal International (GJI).