Free Astronomy Magazine November-December 2026

46 ASTRO PUBLISHING surrounded by strongly tilted gas disks, both relative to each other and to the stars’ orbit. The findings suggest the two stars didn’t form together from a single spinning disk of material, as is often as- sumed, but instead formed inde- pendently and later came together in a close gravitational encounter, revealing a new way close massive binary star systems may form. NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2026 ALMA watches a massive binary assemble in real time by ALMA Observatory Nicolás Lira Jill Malusky Bárbara Ferreira U sing the Atacama Large Mil- limeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), astronomers have captured one of the most detailed three-dimensional views yet of a massive binary star system while it is still being born. By tracking the motions of two young, massive stars over nearly eight years, the team found that the pair follows a highly stretched-out orbit and is Most massive stars are born with stellar companions, and at least 90% are thought to exist in binary or higher-order multiple systems. These massive binaries go on to shape their surroundings dramatically, through supernova explosions and the pro- duction of heavy elements. But be- cause most known massive binaries are only studied long after they’ve finished forming, astronomers have