UF research shows possible alternative to how solar systems form
Solar systems might form differently than was previously thought, UF researchers discovered.
UF astronomy professor Jian Ge and postdoctoral student Bo Ma found two massive planets — a gas giant and a brown dwarf — orbiting a single star within a two-star solar system, called HD 87646, Ge said.
The current theory of planet formation is based on the idea that large amounts of matter float around newly formed stars in a disk shape, Ge said. While this process can form planets around one star, they are not usually as large as those in the HD 87646 system.
“This system we found must have formed from some other method,” Ge said.
The planets orbiting the larger star are a brown dwarf, which is a colossal planet formed by a star that failed to ignite, and a gas giant, an enormous planet composed mostly of gases, he said.
Though the two planets only orbit one star in the two-star system, the two stars are about as close together as our sun is to Uranus, Ge said.
He said the discovery will likely cause astronomers to modify and re-evaluate long-established theories on planet formation.
Invasive species threatens pine trees
Cultivators of the Loblolly pine tree could lose up to $17 billion over the next two decades due to an invasive insect.
Researchers with UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences conducted a two-year study to see how the ambrosia beetle — native to Asia — could affect South Florida’s Loblolly pine trees, said Damian Adams, a UF assistant professor of natural resource economics and policy.
Adams said the ambrosia beetle has killed about 800 million trees, most of which are in the Everglades. About 27 non-native beetle species from Asia have also been found in the U.S.
Adams and other researchers decided to begin the study after noticing the ambrosia beetle’s responsibility in damaging Florida’s avocado crop, he said. They wanted to see if the fungus the beetle produces could harm the Loblolly pine trees like it harms avocado plants, he said.
Florida’s forest industry brings about $16 million and produces about 90,000 jobs, he said.
“Pine trees are a major commodity,” Adams said. “If we lose the pine forest, it could be devastating for the economy.”
UF researchers discover why snakes have no legs
Researchers at UF have uncovered the evolutionary process of how snakes lost their legs.
Through five years of research, Martin Cohn, a UF professor of molecular genetics and microbiology, and Francisca Leal, a UF doctoral candidate, found deletions in an enhancer of the gene responsible for the development of limbs in living organisms. The gene is known as the Sonic Hedgehog gene, Cohn said.
“The research was done to try and understand an evolutionary process and to try and understand how evolution works at the molecular genetic level,” he said.
Cohn and Leal studied the gene in developing ball python embryos and compared it to the genetic activity that occurs during the anole lizard’s limb development. By looking at the gene-by-gene difference in pythons and lizards, the researchers found that three regions associated with snake’s Sonic Hedgehog gene, known as the gene’s enhancer, were no longer present.
During the research, the two also found that when ball python embryos formed, legs started to form during the first day and then degenerated, Cohn said.
“That to me was really amazing that there’s this kind of cryptic development of a nearly complete leg skeleton in the embryo,” Cohn said.
- Isaac Heller
![Photo of the missing Leachianus “Leachie” gecko. [Photo courtesy of Mike Southwick]](https://snworksceo.imgix.net/ufa/907bd92a-0b29-40eb-a5fb-d7db7cf98b2f.sized-1000x1000.jpg?w=1500&ar=16%3A9&fit=crop&crop=faces&facepad=3&auto=format)
