Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
      fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
                    written by a professional astronomer.

                              2020 September 29

                 GW Orionis: A Star System with Titled Rings
     Animation Illustration Credit: ESO, U. Exeter, S. Kraus et al., L.
                                   Calçada

   Explanation: Triple star system GW Orionis appears to demonstrate that
   planets can form and orbit in multiple planes. In contrast, all the
   planets and moons in our Solar System orbit in nearly the same plane.
   The picturesque system has three prominent stars, a warped disk, and
   inner tilted rings of gas and grit. The featured animation
   characterizes the GW Ori system from observations with the European
   Southern Observatory's VLT and ALMA telescopes in Chile. The first part
   of the illustrative video shows a grand vista of the entire system from
   a distant orbit, while the second sequence takes you inside the tilted
   rings to resolve the three central co-orbiting stars. Computer
   simulations indicate that multiple stars in systems like GW Ori could
   warp and break-up disks into unaligned, exoplanet-forming rings.

                    Tomorrow's picture: ear of the eagle
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       Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
            NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply.
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                             & Michigan Tech. U.


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