THE BIRTH OF WORLDS,
IN RINGS OF STARDUST
The ALMA observatory
in Chile, one of Earth’s
most powerful tele-
scope arrays, unveiled
images in 2018 of the
huge, dust-filled disks
around 20 young star sys-
tems. Infant planets—big
babies the size of Saturn
or Neptune—may have
carved gaps in the disks.
—MICHAEL GRESHKOPHOTO: S. ANDREWS AND OTHERS, ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO); S. DAGNELLO, NRAO/AUI/NSFEMBARK | CAPTURED