Astronomers Reveal Mysterious Eclipse After Two Exoplanets Collision

Illustration of debris from exoplanet collisions that caused a mysterious eclipse on its parent planet (photo: dock. NASA)

JAKARTA - The international astronomy team announced a mysterious eclipse that occurred due to the collision of two giant planets. This colliding planet is an exoplanet that surrounds a solar-like star.

The clashes on exoplanets are not new to astronomers. However, this one collision is different. Astronomers first noticed an interplanetary collision in December two years ago.

The remnants of the collision from two planets, reportedly stronger than the earth and lighter than Neptune, were clearly visible. Initially, these debris showed no strange symptoms, but slowly their parent planet system named 2MASS J08152329-3859234 dimmed.

This star only dims about 2.5 years after the collision occurs, which astronomers call eclipses. Astronomers realized this after their infrared observers no longer showed brightness.

Surprisingly, this eclipse lasted for quite a long time, which lasted about 500 days. Quoting fromSpace, Leiden University Professor Matthew Kenworthy who reported this incident said that this incident was very unusual.

The eclipse that occurred for half a year was caused by debris covering the star. Astronomers suspect the debris orbited about 2.5 years before successfully blocking the light from the star.

Meanwhile, it is possible that these debris lined up accidentally in front of the star leading to the point of view of astronomers so that the detected light was reduced and caused symptoms that were considered an eclipse.