James Webb Space Telescope snaps amazing photo of alien asteroid belt

[Admin]

The first asteroid belt ever found outside the solar system is more complex than expected, new observations by the James Webb Space Telescope reveal.

James Webb Space Telescope snaps amazing photo of alien asteroid belt : Read more

 

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The ref paper cited abstract is interesting too. Ref - Spatially resolved imaging of the inner Fomalhaut disk using JWST/MIRI, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-023-01962-6, 08-May-2023. "Abstract Planetary debris disks around other stars are analogous to the asteroid and Kuiper belts in the Solar System. Their structure reveals the configuration of small bodies and provides hints for the presence of planets. The nearby star Fomalhaut hosts one of the most prominent debris disks, resolved by the Hubble Space Telescope, Spitzer, Herschel and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array. Images of this system at mid-infrared wavelengths using JWST/MIRI not only show the narrow Kuiper belt-analogue outer ring, but also that (1) what was thought from indirect evidence to be an asteroid-analogue structure is instead broad, extending outward into the outer system, and (2) there is an intermediate belt, probably shepherded by an unseen planet. The newly discovered belt is demarcated by an inner gap, located at ~78 au, and it is misaligned relative to the outer belt. The previously known collisionally generated dust cloud, Fomalhaut b, could have originated from this belt, suggesting increased dynamical stirring and collision rates there. We also discovered a large dust cloud within the outer ring, possible evidence of another dust-creating collision. Taken together with previous observations, Fomalhaut appears to be the site of a complex and possibly dynamically active planetary system."

Makes me wonder just how much dust and gas is present still, Fomalhaut is said to be some 440E+6 years old (Wikipedia) and mass near 1.92 Msun. My observation. Wikipedia shows properties for Fomalhaut star. Given 1.92 Msun, total dust using MMSN could be 6.392501E+01 (about 64) earth masses but the JWST observations and reporting look like much more found. I did not see a specific amount disclosed. The total dust and gas disc mass could be 6.392501E+03 earth masses but the star's age is said to be 440E+6 years old. So far, no planets are seen in the disc. Some reports in the past are not confirmed now, http://exoplanet.eu/catalog/

 

[rod]

I found this past report on the dust in debris disc of Fomalhaut, some 8-16 lunar masses or about 0.197 earth masses or less. Dust Production Rates in the Fomalhaut Debris Disk from SOFIA/FORCAST Mid-infrared Imaging, https://arxiv.org/abs/1806.09746, 26-Jun-2018. "We present the first spatially resolved mid-infrared (37.1 μm) image of the Fomalhaut debris disk...Under the assumptions that the dust grains are icy aggregates and the debris disk is in steady state, this result is consistent with the dust production rates predicted by Kenyon & Bromley (2008) from theoretical models of icy planet formation. We find a dust luminosity of (7.9±0.8)×10^−4 L⊙ and a dust mass of 8 -- 16 lunar masses, depending on grain porosity, with ∼1 lunar mass in grains with radius 1 μm -- 1 mm. If the grains are icy and highly porous, meter-sized objects must be invoked to explain the far-IR, submm, and mm emission. If the grains are composed of astronomical silicates, there is a dearth of blowout grains (Pawellek et al. 2014) and the mass loss rate is well below the predicted dust production values."

My note, apparently JWST observations showed much more dust at Fomalhaut disk and much larger size in au too.