Stellar Flybys Leaves Permanent Mark on Newly Formed Planetary System
What do the UX Tauri, RW Aurigae, AS 205, Z CMajoris, and FU Orionis have in common? They are young star systems with disks where planets can form. It appears that the discs were disturbed by interstellar flybys or other close encounters in the past. Astronomers want to know: did the event interfere with the formation of planets in the disk? What are they doing? Does this happen on other systems? And, did our solar system experience strange encounters in its youth? Some of the answers lie in research by astronomer Nicolás Cuello of the University of the Grenoble Alpes who heads a team studying the role of interstellar flight. In a recent paper, they discussed the processes this system goes through. They check the probability of a given disk having a flyby/encounter and classify the encounter type. The team is also studying a set of disks to understand what happens during each type of encounter and see the implications of flybys for planet formation in other systems. Finally,