Triple star system found with weirdly warped planetary disc
By Michael Irving
September 06, 2020
An artist's impression of the warped disc of the triple star system GW OrionisESO/
L. Calçada, Exeter/Kraus et al.
VIEW 4 IMAGES
It can be easy to assume that the way things are in our solar system are mostly how they are elsewhere in the universe – but that’s often not the case. Now, astronomers have observed a triple star system that’s warping and splitting its planetary disc into strange new shapes and multiple rings.
Here in our solar system, things are surprisingly well-ordered. All of the planets orbit within a fairly flat disc, and so do objects in the asteroid and Kuiper belts. Most other star systems observed by astronomers seem to have similar structures, thanks to the forces of gravity and momentum squishing dust and gas into discs around stars. Later, this all clumps together to form planets and moons.
ALMA images of the warped disc of the triple star system GW OrionisALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), S. Kraus & J. Bi; NRAO/AUI/NSF, S. Dagnello
Now, astronomers have observed a system where this flat disc is being bent out of shape. Known as GW Orionis, the system lies around 1,300 light-years from Earth and contains three stars orbiting each other. The researchers studied GW Orionis for over 11 years using different instruments on the Very Large Telescope (VLT) and ALMA to resolve the structure of the system, and backed it up with computer simulations of what was going on there.
The team found that the two inner stars orbit each other at 1 Astronomical Unit (AU) apart – the same distance between Earth and the Sun. The third star orbits the other two from further out, at a distance of about 8 AU.
More:
https://newatlas.com/space/triple-star-system-gw-orionis-warped-planetary-disc/#:~:text=Now%2C%20astronomers%20have%20observed%20a,new%20shapes%20and%20multiple%20rings.&text=Known%20as%20GW%20Orionis%2C%20the,three%20stars%20orbiting%20each%20other.
