Jovian planet in globular cluster M4: calm bystander in stellar drama

Long before our Sun and Earth existed, or even the Milky Way galaxy, as we know it today, a planet formed around a sun-like star in one of the earliest homesteaders of our corner of the universe, a globular star cluster.

This planet, a few times more massive than Jupiter has survived the harsh conditions of a globular cluster, a gravitational collision with a binary system, and the death of its progenitor star.