Chance encounter births a binary star system just 60 years ago
Space researchers used ALMA, with follow-up data from VLA, JWST and VLT, to monitor the massive protobinary IRAS 07299−1651, about 5,300 light-years away. They found the two protostars likely formed in separate clouds and later interacted in a chance encounter roughly 60 years ago, resulting in highly eccentric, misaligned orbits and disks. The results, published in Nature Astronomy, suggest some binaries form by capture rather than fragmentation and highlight the chaotic early lives of stars; their future bound status remains uncertain.