Glimpse

Researchers say they’ve glimpsed distant planets forming from collapsing clouds of dust around a young star, providing some of the first evidence for a theory of planet formation. Theorists believe planets are born either from the bottom- up, when dust aggregates and gravitationally attracts more material, or top-down, as dust clouds collapse under gravity. Gaps in disks of dust around young stars, presumably created as protoplanets vacuum up material, provide evidence for the bottom-up scenario.