Scientists have named the youngest known planet in the universe.

Astronomers have confirmed the existence of the gas giant Elias 2-24 b, less than 1 million years old. The planet continues to form inside the gas and dust disk of its star, which allows scientists to observe one of the earliest stages of the birth of planets. How astronomers discovered the young planet and why its existence raises questions for modern models is described in the "Izvestia" article.

The youngest planet turned out to be a giant

Elias 2-24 b has become the youngest planet known to date. Its age is less than 1 million years old, and it remains inside the disk of gas and dust surrounding the young star. The planet is roughly comparable in mass to Jupiter and is located about 450 light-years from Earth.

The scientists' research was published on September 16, 2026 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters (TAJL). The authors studied archival observations of seven young stars made using the coronagraph of the Keck Observatory in Hawaii. This device allows you to block out a significant part of the bright light of the star, so that astronomers can look for dimmer objects nearby.

The researchers found Elias 2-24 b inside a gap in the dust disk of its star. Such gaps can occur under the influence of forming planets: a celestial body collects matter around itself and gradually changes the structure of the surrounding disk. According to scientists, it is in such gaps that young planets should be looked for.

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How scientists discovered Elias 2-24 b

Observing planets at the earliest stages of formation is especially difficult. They are surrounded by dense matter that can hide them from telescopes. Therefore, most known exoplanets are detected in a different way — by periodically reducing the brightness of the star when the planet passes in front of it. For young planets located far from their stars and hidden inside dust disks, this method is much less effective.

In the case of Elias 2-24 b, scientists were able to take advantage of the features of the disk surrounding it. Even earlier, observations by the ALMA telescope in Chile showed the presence of a gap in the dust disk of the young star Elias 2-24. Later, the European Southern Observatory's "Very Large Telescope" detected a faint light source inside this gap.

Astronomers suggested that they might have a planet, but it was not immediately possible to confirm this. The object was at the limit of the capabilities of existing telescopes, and its estimated age posed an additional problem. According to existing models, a planet the size of Jupiter should take much longer to form, especially if it is located at a great distance from its star.

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Why did the discovery call into question the models of planet formation?

Elias 2-24 b is about 55 times farther from its star than Earth is from the Sun. At the same time, its age is less than 1 million years old. For comparison, current models suggest that the formation of a Jupiter-sized planet at a distance comparable to the orbit of Jupiter itself takes about 5 million years. If the planet is much further away from the star, the process, according to these models, should take even more time.

Thus, the detection of Elias 2-24 b poses a problem for existing ideas about the formation of gas giants.

The authors of the work believe that observing Elias 2-24 b can help identify processes that are not yet taken into account in theories of planet formation. The young system gives scientists the opportunity to study not an already formed gas giant, but a planet in the process of birth.

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How archived data helped to confirm the discovery

To verify the nature of the discovered object, the team of Andrea Bernardi, a graduate student at Diego Portales University in Chile and the head of the study, turned to the archive of the Keck Observatory. The researchers found images of Elias 2-24 taken in 2018 and 2020. By comparing the observations, the scientists were able to trace the movement of the faint object relative to the star.

The object's motion turned out to be characteristic of a planet orbiting its star. This made it possible to rule out two other possible explanations — a background star located much further away and an image artifact. As a result, the object was confirmed as Elias 2-24 b.

According to the researchers, in this case, the combination of observations from several telescopes proved decisive. ALMA data allowed us to see the disk's structure, observations from the "Very Large Telescope" showed a faint object inside the gap, and archival images of Keck helped to trace its movement and confirm its planetary nature.

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What will the new Roman telescope give astronomers?

Scientists expect that the discovery of Elias 2-24 b will be one of the examples of how planets can be explored at the earliest stages of their existence. Nowadays, such objects are difficult to find because of the brightness of the stars and the gas and dust surrounding them. Therefore, in the catalog of known exoplanets, most objects are much older and are located closer to their stars.

NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope should provide additional opportunities for searching for young planets. It was launched on August 30, 2026 and is equipped with a more advanced coronagraph designed to detect faint objects near bright stars.

According to NASA, Roman will be able to search for planets in closer orbits, including Jupiter analogues, which are still difficult to observe due to the brightness of their stars. The data obtained can help astronomers discover more young planets and study the stages of their formation, which are still poorly understood.