Hubble Spots Giant, Turbulent Planet-Forming Disk 40 Times Wider Than Our Solar System

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has captured the largest known protoplanetary disk around the young star IRAS 23077+6707 (nicknamed Dracula’s Chivito), extending about 400 billion miles—roughly 40 times the Solar System’s diameter. Seen nearly edge-on in visible light, the disk is unusually turbulent and asymmetric, with filament-like features on one side and a sharp edge on the other, hinting at dynamic infall of material and environmental interactions. With an estimated mass 10–30 times Jupiter’s, the system may host a large planetary system and provides a valuable laboratory for understanding planet formation in extreme conditions.