Live science
By Brendon Specktor
July 25, 2023
A strangely-flickering star has led two of the world’s most powerful telescopes to a rare and wonderful sight: A young star system, pregnant with enormous clumps of gas, on the verge of birthing a giant, Jupiter-size planet.
Scientists discovered the stellar baby bumps around a star called V960 Mon, located roughly 5,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Monoceros (Greek for “the unicorn”). This star first caught astronomers’ attention in 2014, when it suddenly brightened to more than 20 times its original luminosity and then faded over several months. Several studies suggested the presence of an invisible companion star playing gravitational tricks on V960 Mon, forcing globs of gas and dust onto the star and causing it to brighten and grow.