Pair of interacting Stars Create Concentric Rings of Dust

Ryan Lau, an astronomer at NSF NOIRLab, has led some of the first observations with NASA’s JWST, finding at least 17 rings of dust emanating from a binary star system. The new data show that the dust is rich in carbon and seems to be surviving to seed space far beyond its parent star with heavy elements, meaning it could play a role in the formation of later stars and planets.