Epsilon Eridani - a nearby solar system much like our own

An international team of astronomers, including Walter Gear from MSSL, has announced the discovery of a ring of dust particles around a nearby star, Epsilon Eridani, that appears to signify a Solar System very similar to our own. This is a sketch of our own Solar System, showing the Sun and the giant planets (Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune) surrounded by the Kuiper Belt - a `ring' containing vast numbers of comets. A submillimetre image made using SCUBA on the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope in Hawaii, suggests that a similar system may exist around Eps Eri.

More information about this exciting new discovery may be found on the web pages of the Joint Astronomy Centre, Hawaii in this special press release.

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