An astonishing new photo of space has been captured by a telescope. The photo shows exoplanets, planets outside our Solar System, which are still in their early stages of development or also called baby planets.
This exoplanet is named as 2M0437b, with a size estimated to be several times that of Jupiter so it is quite massive. It orbits a star about 417 light years from Earth.
Its age is estimated to be 'new' a few million years, so it is much younger than the planets in our Solar System, which formed about 4.5 billion years ago. Even so young, it is likely that the temperature of this planet is as hot as lava due to the energy released in the process of its formation.
Scientists discovered 2M0437b with the Subaru Telescope, which captured images of the planet illuminated by its star. The Subaru Telescope, which is 8.2 meters wide, is placed on top of Mount Apo Maunake in Hawaii and is operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan.
"This fortunate discovery has added to the list of elite planets that we can observe directly with telescopes," said Eric Gaidos, lead author of the research.
"By analyzing the light from this planet, we can also say something about its composition and perhaps where and how it formed around its star," he added.
In fact, the planet has been detected since 2018 by the Subaru telescope. However, it will take some research to confirm this more thoroughly. Future telescopes, especially NASA's James Webb which is soon to be launched, may be able to dig deeper and more detailed information about this planet in the future.