Washington, Oct 21 (ANI): A new study is said to have found evidence of water vapour emanating from ice on dust grains in the disc around a young star, thereby revealing a hidden ice reservoir the size of a thousand oceans.
ESA's Herschel space observatory has found TW Hydrae, a star between 5-10 million years old, and only 176 light-years away, is in the final stage of formation, and is surrounded by a disc of dust and gas that may condense to form a complete set of planets.
The telltale water vapour signature, which is believed to have been produced when the ice coated dust grains are warmed by interstellar UV radiation, has been detected throughout the disc around the young star, and, though weaker than expected, it hints at a substantial reservoir of ice.
"The detection of water sticking to dust grains throughout the disc would be similar to events in our own Solar System's evolution, where over millions of years, similar dust grains then coalesced to form comets," Michiel Hogerheijde from the Leiden University in the Netherlands, who led the study, said.
"These comets we believe became a contributing source of water for the planets," he said.
For the study, the scientists ran detailed simulations, combining the new data with previous ground-based observations and some from NASA's Spitzer telescope.
From this they calculated the size of the ice reservoirs in the planet-forming regions and found that the total amount of water in the disc aroundW Hydrae would fill several thousand Earth oceans.
"We already have approved time on Herschel to study more planet-forming regions around three other stars," Hogerheijde said.
"We believe that will show similar results in terms of the water detections, but as our next observations will be of objects up to three times further in distance away, we'll need many more hours of observation time," he said. (ANI)
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