10⁷ Planetary Scale (Space) Witnessing Moon Birth at the ALMA Observatory

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) — a powerful radio telescope in Chile that observes cold dust and gas at millimeter wavelengths — astronomers have made the
first clear detection of a moon-forming disc around an exoplanet. The young Jupiter-like planet PDS 70c, located about 400 light-years away, is surrounded by a circumplanetary disc of material where moons may be forming. Roughly the size of Earth’s orbit, this disc contains enough dust and gas to create lunar-scale satellites. The discovery offers a rare glimpse into how planets and their moons take shape in distant star systems.