Astronomers have observed two planets forming in the disk around a young star named WISPIT 2. Having previously detected one planet, the team has now employed European Southern Observatory (ESO) telescopes to confirm the presence of another. These observations, and the unique structure of the disk around the star, indicate that the WISPIT 2 system could resemble a young solar system.

"WISPIT 2 is the best look into our own past that we have to date," says Chloe Lawlor, Ph.D. student at the University of Galway, Ireland, and lead author of the study published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The system is only the second known, after PDS 70, where two planets have been directly observed in the process of forming around their host star. Unlike PDS 70, however, WISPIT 2 has a very extended planet-forming disk with distinctive gaps and rings.

"These structures suggest that more planets are currently forming, which we will eventually detect," Lawlor says.

"WISPIT 2 gives us a critical laboratory not just to observe the formation of a single planet but an entire planetary system," says Christian Ginski, study co-author and researcher at the University of Galway.

With such observations, astronomers aim to better understand how baby planetary systems develop into mature ones, like our own.

The first newborn planet found in the system—named WISPIT 2b—was detected last year, with a mass almost five times that of Jupiter and orbiting the central star at around 60 times the distance between Earth and the sun.