Overview

• New research suggests gas giants like Jupiter may initially form with significantly flattened shapes, challenging traditional theories of planetary formation.
• The findings, based on computer simulations, could reshape our understanding of the early stages of planetary formation within protostellar disks.
• The theory of disk instability, as opposed to the widely accepted core accretion model, may better explain the formation of gas giants far from their host stars.
• Observations of only three protoplanets so far have shown them to be surprisingly flat, with a typical flattening of 90%, compared to Saturn's 10% and Jupiter's 6%.
• Future observations by the James Webb Space Telescope and other observatories are expected to provide more data to support these findings.