Hubble Spots a Suspected Second-Generation Planet

What happened

In a study published Monday in Nature Astronomy, researchers report uncovering a surprising chemical clue that indicates the white dwarf star HS 0209+0832 may host a second-generation planet. If confirmed, this planet will be the first "second-generation" planet ever confirmed.

Diligent sleuthing by astronomers has broken open a cold case in the data archive of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Hubble Spots a Suspected Second-Generation Planet By Matthew Williams - October 12, 2026 06:11 PM UTC | Planetary Science When stars reach the end of their life cycles, they undergo gravitational collapse and shed their outer layers.

More massive stars leave a black hole, while smaller stars leave a remnant known as a neutron star or a "white dwarf." The shed gas and dust form a nebula, a bright envelope illuminated by the white dwarf's radiation.

But for some time, astronomers have speculated that new generations of planets may form as the gas and dust settle into a new accretion disk. After combing through the Hubble Space Telescope's data archive, a team led by researchers from the University of Warwick uncovered a star that may host a planet formed from accreted matter shed by a stellar remnant. The system, known as HS 0209+0832 , is a white dwarf star about 1% the Sun's radius but about 60% as massive.