This illustration depicts the result of a collision between two large asteroid-sized bodies: a massive debris cloud around a young star.
NASA’s Spitzer saw a debris cloud block the star HD 166191, giving scientists details about the smashup that occu NASA has shared an image depicting what researchers say is the first observation of a debris cloud from a massive celestial collision.In a study published earlier this month in the Astrophysical Journal, a group of astronomers led by the University of Arizona reported when the debris cloud passed in front of its star and briefly blocked the light, also called a transit.
Using their knowledge about the star's size, they were able to determine the size of the cloud shortly after impact, estimate the size of the objects that collided and see the speed with which the cloud dispersed.
While astronomers using NASA's retired Spitzer Space Telescope have previously found evidence of these types of collisions around young stars where rocky planets are forming, those observations did not provide many details about the events. "There is no substitute for being an eyewitness to an event," co-author George Rieke said in a statement. "All the cases reported previously from Spitzer have been unresolved, with only theoretical hypotheses about what the actual event and debris cloud might have looked like."The authors began making routing observations of a 10 million-year-old star called HD 166191 in 2015.NASA said that the team used the Spitzer telescope to conduct more than 100 observations of the system over the course of the next four years.RELATED: NASA: Bright star, galaxies captured in latest James Webb telescope optical testingAt around that time in the star's life, dust left over.