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Concept
HD 172555
Résumé
HD 172555 is a white-hot Type A7V star located relatively close by, 95 light years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Pavo. Spectrographic evidence indicates a relatively recent collision between two planet-sized bodies that destroyed the smaller of the two, which had been at least the size of the Moon, and severely damaged the larger one, which was at least the size of Mercury. Evidence of the collision was detected by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.
HD 172555 was first recognized in the 1980s as being unusually bright in the mid-infrared by the IRAS sky survey. Follow-up ground-based observations by Schütz et al. and the Spitzer Space Telescope, also in 2004, confirmed the unusually strong nature of the infrared spectral emission from this system, much brighter than what would be emitted normally from the star's surface. As part of the Beta Pictoris moving group, HD 172555 is coeval with that more famous system, approximately 20 million years old, and is the same kind of white-hot star as Beta Pic, about twice as massive as the Sun and about 9.5 times as luminous. Comparison with current planetary formation theories, and with the very similar Beta Pic system, suggests that HD 172555 is in the early stages of terrestrial (rocky) planet formation.
What makes HD 172555 special is the presence of a large amount of unusual silicaceous material – amorphous silica and SiO gas – not the usual rocky materials, silicates like olivine and pyroxene, which make up much of the Earth as well. The material in the disk was analyzed in 2009 by Carey Lisse, of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, MD using the infrared spectrometer on board the Spitzer Space Telescope, and the results of the Deep Impact and STARDUST comet missions. Analysis of the atomic and mineral composition, dust temperature, and dust mass show a massive (about a Moon's mass worth) amount of warm (about 340K) material similar to re-frozen lava (obsidian) and flash-frozen magma (tektite) as well as copious amounts of vaporized rock (silicon monoxide or SiO gas) and rubble (large dark pieces of dust) in a region at 5.
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