We believe this process of forming stars in a cluster was exactly the same thing that happened with our very own sun 4 1/2 billion years ago. It tells us a lot about the history of our own solar system.
Stars we're looking at here are prior to the formation of planets, we think, but it's not going to be very much longer in astronomical terms before planets start forming.
This is the first really good demonstration that the theory works on something like a star cluster.
If you look at the very young stars in the cluster and the spacing between them, it isn't random spacing. They're all about the same distance apart.