14 DAY TRIAL // The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) isn't even completed yet and it's already churning out spectacular "images." The millimeter/submillimeter telescope (which sits between an infrared telescope and a radio telescope) was pointed at a star, R Sculptoris, a very old one that is on its last breath.
What it found was quite surprising, scientists at the European Southern Observatory discovered a strange spiral distribution of the gas surrounding the red giant.
They were able to see the pattern since they created a three dimensional representation of the star and the gasses around it, the first of its kind.
The spiral shape is indication of a companion star, hidden from view, circling the red giant. For scientists, the exciting stuff is the detailed new data they were able to gather with ALMA. But everyone can appreciate the images created from that data.