University of Cambridge, UK | ESA | Gaia | 2015 July 17
[c][attachment=0]Gaia14aae.jpg[/attachment][/c][hr][/hr]The Gaia satellite has discovered a unique binary system where one star is ‘eating’ the other, but neither star has any hydrogen, the most common element in the Universe. The system could be an important tool for understanding how binary stars might explode at the end of their lives.
An international team of researchers, with the assistance of amateur astronomers, have discovered a unique binary star system: the first known such system where one star completely eclipses the other. It is a type of two-star system known as a Cataclysmic Variable, where one super dense white dwarf star is stealing gas from its companion star, effectively ‘cannibalising’ it.
The system could also be an important laboratory for studying ultra-bright supernova explosions, which are a vital tool for measuring the expansion of the Universe. Details of the new research will be published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
The system, named Gaia14aae, is located about 730 light years away in the Draco constellation. It was discovered by the European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite in August 2014 when it suddenly became five times brighter over the course of a single day. ...
Total eclipse of the heart: The AM CVn Gaia14aae / ASSASN-14cn - H. C. Campbell et al
- Monthly Notices of the RAS 452(1) 1060 (2015 Sep 01) DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stv1224
arXiv.org > astro-ph > arXiv:1507.04663 > 16 Jul 2015
