Unprecedented Discovery: Metal ‘Scar’ Found on Magnetic White Dwarf WD 0816-310 Raises Questions of Planetary Feeding

1 of 1 Illustration of the magnetic white dwarf WD 0816-310 with a metal scar — Photo: ESO/L. Calçada/BBC Illustration of the magnetic white dwarf WD 0816-310 with a metal scar — Photo: ESO/L. Calçada/BBC

Astronomers in the United Kingdom have discovered evidence that a star could be “feeding” on nearby planets and asteroids.

A kind of Metal ‘scar’ found on dead star’s surface it had never been seen before, said astronomer John Landstreet of the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium astronomical research center in Northern Ireland.

The scar, which is believed to have 500 km long, was in a remnant of an Earth-sized star in a nearby solar system. The star no longer creates energy in its core, which is why it is said to be dead.

The white dwarf star was named WD 0816-310 by research astronomers.

Research found that the scar developed after the white dwarf ingested neighboring planets and asteroids that were born at the same time as itcausing a concentration of metals that leaves marks on the star’s surface.

Landstreet, co-author of the research paper, is a member of the team that discovered the first magnetic white dwarf in 1970.

“Surprisingly, the material was not uniformly mixed on the surface of the star, as predicted by theory,” he said.

Instead, this scar is a concentrated patch of planetary material, held in place by the same magnetic field that guided the falling fragments. Nothing like this has been seen before.

The research was conducted by an international team of scientists using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), based in Chile.

At 500 km long, the scar is approximately the same size as Vesta – the second largest asteroid in our solar system.

Astronomers said the strength of the metal detection was synchronized with observed changes in the star’s magnetic field, which led the team to determine that the metal scar was located at one of the star’s magnetic poles.

This showed that metals were channeled into the star by its magnetic field, creating the scar.

Stefano Bagnulo, an astronomer at Armagh Observatory and Planetarium, said it was well known that some white dwarfs were “feeding” on pieces of their planetary systems.

“We now discover that the white dwarf’s magnetic field plays a key role in this process, resulting in a scar on its surface,” he said.

What is a white dwarf star?

A white dwarf is the burned-out remains of a dead star. This will happen to our Sun in about five billion years.

When a star dies, gravity causes heavier elements to move toward the center, while lighter elements, such as hydrogen or helium, rise to the outer layer.

At their hottest, stars have hydrogen atmospheres, but as stars cool over time, they tend to have helium atmospheres.

But typical white dwarfs don’t have one side of the star dedicated to one element and the other dominated by another.

2024-03-02 08:00:33
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