Scientists have discovered a white dwarf star, which probably originated when two dead stars fused into one. Scientists write that in the trade journal Nature Astronomy.
Two stars that orbit around 150 light-years from the earth, melted together an estimated 1.3 billion years ago into one. They were both already deceased and only the cores were left.
The resulting white dwarf is twice as large as normal. Normally these stars have 0.6 times the mass of our sun, but this star has 1.14 solar mass. In terms of size, the star has about a third of the diameter of the earth.
It didn’t matter much, according to astronomers, if the white dwarf had exploded and become a supernova. With its large size, the star is in the danger zone to explode after dying with the light of up to a billion suns. However, this has not happened and astronomers have yet to find out the reason for this, also by looking at other ‘just-not-supernovas’.
Star had unusual atmosphere
The star, named WDJ0551 + 4135, was photographed by the European Gaia satellite, which has mapped millions of stars. The star attracted attention, among other things, because the atmosphere had an unusual structure, which led to further research and the theory that it was created by a clump of two white dwarfs.
White dwarfs are the cores of deceased stars. When a star dies, it first expands and becomes a red giant. Then it repels its outer shell until a core remains.
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