A growing baby planet photographed for first time in a ring of darkness

Written by Daniel Stolte and originally posted at UA News. Featured on kvoa.com.

A team of astronomers has detected — for the first time — a growing planet outside our solar system, embedded in a cleared gap of a multi-ringed disk of dust and gas. The team, led by University of Arizona astronomer Laird Close and Richelle van Capelleveen, an astronomy Ph.D. student at Leiden Observatory in the Netherlands, discovered the unique exoplanet using the University of Arizona’s MagAO-X extreme adaptive optics system at the Magellan Telescope in Chile, the U of A’s LBT telescope in Arizona and the Very Large Telescope, or VLT, at the European Southern Observatory in Chile. Their results are published in two papers appearing on Aug. 26 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.


Composite photo of the WISPIT 2 system as seen by the Magellan Telescope in Chile and the Large Binocular Telescope in Arizona. The protoplanet WISPIT 2b appears as a purple dot in a dust-free gap between a bright, white dust ring around the star and a fainter, outer ring, orbiting at about 56 times the average distance between the Earth and the sun. The other potential planet, CC1, appears as the red object inside the dust free cavity and is estimated to be about 15 Earth-sun distances from its host star. Credit: Laird Close, University of Arizona.


For years, astronomers have observed several dozen planet-forming disks of gas and dust surrounding young stars. Many of these disks display gaps in their rings, hinting at the possibility that they are being “plowed” by nearby nascent planets, or protoplanets, like lanes being cleared by a snowplow. Yet, only about three actual young growing protoplanets have been discovered to date, all in the cavities between a host star and the inner edge of its adjacent protoplanetary disk. Until this discovery, no protoplanets had been seen in the conspicuous disk gaps — which appear as dark rings.

“Dozens of theory papers have been written about these observed disk gaps being caused by protoplanets, but no one’s ever found a definitive one until today,” said Close, professor of astronomy at the University of Arizona. He calls the discovery a “big deal,” because the absence of planet discoveries in places where they should be has prompted many in the scientific community to invoke alternative explanations for the ring-and-gap pattern found in many proto-planetary disks.
“It’s been a point of tension, actually, in the literature and in astronomy in general, that we have these really dark gaps, but we cannot detect the faint exoplanets in them,” he said. “Many have doubted that protoplanets can make these gaps, but now we know that in fact, they can. “

4.5 billion years ago, our solar system began as just such a disk. As dust coalesced into clumps, sucking up gas around them, the first protoplanets began to form. How exactly this process unfolded, however, is still largely a mystery. To find answers, astronomers have looked to other planetary systems that are still in their infancy, known as planet-forming disks, or protoplanetary disks.

Close’s team took advantage of an adaptive optics (AO) system, one of the most formidable of its kind in the world, developed and built by Jared Males, Laird Close and their students. Jared Males is an associate astronomer at Steward Observatory and the principal investigator of MagAO-X. MagAO-X, which stands for “Magellan Adaptive Optics System eXtreme,” dramatically improves the sharpness and resolution of telescope images by compensating for atmospheric turbulence, the phenomenon that causes stars to flicker and blur, and is dreaded by astronomers.

Suspecting there should be invisible planets hiding in the gaps of protoplanetary disks, Close’s team surveyed all the disks with gaps and probed them for a specific emission of visible light known as hydrogen alpha or H-alpha.

“As planets form and grow, they suck in hydrogen gas from their surroundings, and as that gas crashes down on them like a giant waterfall coming from outer space and hits the surface, it creates extremely hot plasma, which in turn, emits this particular H-alpha light signature,” Close explained. “MagAO-X is specially designed to look for hydrogen gas falling onto young protoplanets, and that’s how we can detect them.”


In this artist’s illustration, infalling hydrogen gas causes the growing protoplanet WISPIT 2b to shine brightly in the hydrogen alpha spectrum, to which the MagAO-X instrument is particularly sensitive.
Art from Joseph Olmsted/STScI/NASA

The team used the 6.5-meter Magellan Telescope and MagAO-X to probe WISPIT-2, a disk van Capelleveen recently discovered with the VLT. Viewed in H-alpha light, Close’s group struck gold. A dot of light appeared inside the gap between two rings of the protoplanetary disk around the star. In addition, the team observed a second candidate planet inside the “cavity” between the star and the inner edge of the dust and gas disk.

“Once we turned on the adaptive optics system, the planet jumped right out at us,” said Close, who called this one of the more important discoveries in his career. “After combining two hours’ worth of images, it just popped out.”

According to Close, the planet, designated WISPIT 2b, is a very rare example of a protoplanet in the process of accreting material onto itself. Its host star, WISPIT 2 is similar to the sun and about the same mass. The inner planet candidate, dubbed CC1, contains about 9 Jupiter masses, whereas the outer planet, WISPIT 2b, weighs in at about 5 Jupiter masses. These masses were inferred, in part, from the thermal infrared light observed by the University of Arizona’s 8.4-meter Large Binocular Telescope on Mount Graham in Southeastern Arizona with the help of U of A astronomy graduate student Gabriel Weible.

“It’s a bit like what our own Jupiter and Saturn would have looked like when they were 5,000 times younger than they are now,” Weible said. “The planets in the WISPIT-2 system appear to be about 10 times more massive than our own gas giants and more spread out. But the overall appearance is likely not so different from what a nearby ‘alien astronomer’ could have seen in a ‘baby picture’ of our solar system taken 4.5 billion years ago.”


University of Arizona’s MagAO-X instrument in the clean room at the Magellan Telescope in Chile. Photo credit: Jared Males 

“Our MagAO-X adaptive optics system is optimized like no other to work well at the H-alpha wavelength, so you can separate the bright starlight from the faint protoplanet,” Close said. “Around WISPIT 2 you likely have two planets and four rings and four gaps. It’s an amazing system.”

CC1 might orbit at about 14-15 astronomical units (AU) — with one AU equaling the average distance between the sun and Earth, which would place it halfway between Saturn and Uranus, if it was part of our solar system, according to Close. WISPIT-2b, the planet carving out the gap, is farther out at about 56 AU, which in our own solar system, would put it well past the orbit of Neptune, around the outer edge of the Kuiper Belt.

A second paper published in parallel and led by Richelle van Capelleveen and the University of Galway details the detection of the planet in the infrared light spectrum and the discovery of the multi-ringed system with the 8-meter VLT telescope’s SPHERE adaptive optics system.

“To see planets in the fleeting time of their youth, astronomers have to find young disk systems, which are rare,” van Capelleveen said, “because that’s the one time that they really are brighter and so detectable. If the WISPIT-2 system was the age of our solar system and we used the same technology to look at it, we’d see nothing. Everything would be too cold and too dark.”

This research was supported in part by a grant from the NASA eXoplanet Research Program (XRP). MagAO-X was developed in part by a grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation and by the generous support of the Heising-Simons Foundation. 

Laird Close et al. 2025 “Wide Separation Planets In Time (WISPIT): Discovery of a Gap H-alpha Protoplanet WISPIT 2b with MagAO-X”:  https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/adf7a5

Richelle van Capelleveen et al. 2025 “WIde Separation Planets In Time (WISPIT): A gap-clearing planet in a multi-ringed disk around the young solar-type star WISPIT 2”:  https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/adf721

MagAO-X 2024B Day 21: The kids are alright

Did you know it’s voting day in Chile? A whole national holiday, everyone off the mountain to go participate in government. (Well not viscachas. But all the human crew.) Really! They brought the turno bus up on the weekend, instead of a typical Tuesday. The summit was going to be mine, a little staycation, some peace and quiet, boundless bouncing, etc.

But those kids… there they were. Here when no one else was. Cawing to my colleague Carlos. Scarfing down cold empanadas like it was 12 midnight instead of 12 noon. Napping on public couches. Rolling on public pool tables. Crawling around the boulders. Cracking open stones. Performing impressionistic rock percussion (hearing bells chime). Staring off to the vistas.

Now I’m a humble viscacha. I have my perch, and I stick to it. I huddle close to the eves in the mornings, and I sun bathe in the evenings. It’s demanding, standing watch over the cleanroom. I don’t mind. What better place to keep an eye on things?

Want to know what I notice? That every few seasons there are these astronomers that just don’t quit. They’re here week after week, even when the turno changes. Even when they think, or even mutter to themselves “I know I got to get away.” So of course these were the astronomers to upend a quiet weekend.

I’m a Vizzy who minds his business. But even I noticed a regular wasn’t here this time. Not that I was prying, but there were a lot more questions and running around this time. Like “are you sure that’s where that cable goes?” and “wait did we remember to grab the nitrogen tank?” and “what do you mean it’s not in the handbook?” and “dos? Dos? Dos mas??” Not that I’d get involved, but seemed a lot like a tricycle operation learning to be a bike. Whole new levels of confidence and skill to get things off the ground.

But they did it. Just in case anyone needed some kind of, oh I don’t know, summary or conclusive account. From someone in a senior position.

Those kids worked themselves and their telescope to the bone. Who else would let so much morning light into Clay’s dome? Who else would have a TO shuttle up 20ish pounds of empanadas? What other crew would attempt to commission a half dozen new technologies in just two weeks? What other team could get so many of them to be success?

(Please see: documentation of dawn observing submitted to evidence.)

I think this means something. Like they’ve grown up. Or that shiny box they keep shuttling around has passed some sort of say, bus test.

After weeks of this nonsense, seems like they’ve finally packed up. The AO kids have been trickling out for the last few days. I know if [they] don’t, [they]’ll go out of [their] mind. I got some good byes, some good last chats. This final crew? I think they got a good last sunset too. The whole package, green flash and all.

So. The kids are alright. Old kids and new kids (and new new kids). And kids who didn’t make it this time. I know them all pretty well. I’ll look forward to seeing big smiles next time they see me. Which will probably be in what, three months, four? They just can’t stay away.

Song of the Day

The Kids Are Alright by The Who

In recognition of astronomically significant time intervals

According to Poor Vizzy’s Almanack, every October 14th some nonsense transpires in Tucson, Arizona. Usually having to do with this guy.

This time, he received a surfeit of cupcakes:

Artisanal wrapping paper:

A Starbuck™:

Many happy returns!

Inspirational stickers will be available through the usual channels.

Song of the Day

Well, what’d you expect?

Happy Birthday Swing – Lucky Seven

MagAO-X Takes Montréal Day 5: La conférence d’espionnage

It is extremely illegal to smuggle Andean mammals of the high desert into downtown Montréal, but I have always wanted to try poutine, and MagAO-X already got me as far as Tucson anyway.

At the border, I tried to explain I was going to the SPIE conference but I’m not sure Google Translate was working.

Today, Laird and Lauren both gave their talks, which I’m sure were lovely, but I honestly had trouble staying awake after the long flight from Tucson. Here’s a picture of me trying to pay attention to a conversation between Olivier, Jared, and Laird.

It was worth the price of the ticket just to see all three in person, again. See you in November, señores!

Song of the Day

The Canadian Fish and Wildlife Service is hot on my tail, so I must return to Chile… but I don’t regret a thing.

“Non, je ne regrette rien” — Edith Piaf