Puny Parent? Planets may form around tiny orbs

Barely more massive than a planet itself, a failed star 500 light-years from Earth is nevertheless cloaked in a disk of gas and dust from which planets could coalesce. The finding highlights the possibility that planet formation may be even more common than researchers had previously suggested.

PLANET POTENTIAL. Artist’s depiction of a newly discovered protoplanetary disk around a faint, low-mass brown dwarf.