From past studies, scientists know that Beta Pictoris hosts at least two giant planets. Both are much more massive than Jupiter. The researchers also caught a glimpse of the first known exocomet, or comet outside the solar system, circling in a cloud of debris.
However, it is the debris disk that is of interest to the researchers. The Webb telescope will be able to see through the dust to potentially see the effects of collisions between asteroids, comets, planetesimals, and other small objects.
Two 1 . cycle probes
Two probes are planned in Webb’s first series of observations, known as Cycle 1. The team led by Chris Stark, a postdoctoral program fellow at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, will use a coronagraph (a star-blocking device) to observe the debris disk. in more detail.
This study aims to answer the key question of how similar this system is to the Milky Way. For example, Stark’s team hopes to track how dust and water ice in the outer belt of debris clouds migrate to the interior.
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