Webb Telescope Uncovers Rare Planet‑Shattering Collisions in Young Star Systems

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has examined 21 extreme debris disks—rare dusty environments around young stars that signal violent collisions. Webb’s mid‑infrared spectra, combined with archival Spitzer data, revealed that one‑third of these disks are silica‑rich, pointing to high‑energy impacts between Mars‑sized bodies, while the remaining two‑thirds are silica‑poor, indicating smaller, grazing collisions involving Moon‑sized objects. The study shows that silica‑rich disks appear only around stars younger than 300 million years, whereas silica‑poor disks persist across a wide age range and often display pronounced brightness variations. These findings help astronomers reconstruct the chaotic early stages of planetary systems, including the violent event that likely formed Earth’s Moon.