Astronomers have found that Earth-like planets break apart and possess tails.

Astronomers have discovered two planets orbiting different stars hundreds of light-years away from us. These are rocky planets, meaning they share a similar composition to Earth and are nearly the same size. Under the influence of their stars, these planets are disintegrating rapidly by cosmic standards, creating a debris tail that resembles a comet's tail. The research findings have been published on the preprint server arXiv, as reported by ScienceAlert.

Both planets belong to a rare class of planets with ultra-short orbital periods, which means they are situated very close to their stars. As a result, these planets are subjected to strong radiation, heating, and gravitational effects from their stars. Such planets are rarely more than twice the size of Earth. The discovered planets, which are evaporating under their stars' influence, provide a rare opportunity for astronomers to learn about the internal composition of terrestrial planets.

The first planet, which is disintegrating, is named BD+054868Ab, and it completes an orbit around its orange dwarf star in just 1.27 days. Due to the evaporation of material, the planet has developed a comet-like tail that extends approximately 9 million kilometers.

Scientists have determined that BD+054868Ab is losing mass at a rate of 10 Earth masses per billion years. Considering that this planet is slightly larger than Earth, it will be completely destroyed in just a few million years.

The second planet is called K2-22b, and it orbits its red dwarf star in only 9 hours. This planet also has a long tail of material evaporating from its surface.

Researchers found that the material evaporating from the planets originates from their mantle, rather than their core.

Thanks to these observations, astronomers have gained a unique opportunity to understand the internal composition of terrestrial planets. By studying such planets, we can gain a clearer understanding of the components that make up Mercury, Venus, and Mars, which are also classified as terrestrial planets.