What is the resulting thin, pancake-shaped structure rotating around the hot core called?
Answer
protoplanetary disk
The conservation of angular momentum, which forces the contracting nebula to spin up rapidly, simultaneously causes the material to flatten out perpendicular to its axis of rotation. This flattening is similar to how pizza dough spreads when tossed and spun. The result of this immense rotational force acting against the inward pull of gravity is the formation of a flat, disk-like structure. This structure, which rotates around the increasingly massive and hot central object, is precisely what is known as the protoplanetary disk. This disk contains the raw material—the dust and gas—from which all the planets, asteroids, and comets will eventually accrete.
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