Scientists discover a “mysterious” star

Astronomers from a British university have discovered two unusual stars. Among the white dwarfs, the older, red-hued star is particularly enigmatic.

Humanity has taken another step into the infinite depths of space. Thanks to the scientists University of Warwick, who discovered two “unusual” stars. Among the two white dwarfs named WDJ2147-4035 and WDJ1922+0233, the former is particularly puzzling.

Both stars are polluted by planetary debris, according to reports University of Warwick on your website, where WDJ1922 + 0233 is “unusually blue”. In contrast, WDJ2147-4035 stands out as the “redder” and “dimmer” white star yet discovered in the Local Galactic Region. “

What are white dwarfs

White dwarfs are like dead stars. They have depleted their energy and have been undergoing a process of shrinkage and cooling ever since. Fate overtakes 97% of all stars, one day our sun will burn out, and some of the planets revolving around it will be destroyed. Scientists assume that this will be the case in about five billion years.

However, our solar system is very different from WDJ2147-4035. What makes a star 90 light-years from Earth so special isn’t just its age. At 10.7 billion years old, it is the oldest known white dwarf in our galaxy, the Milky Way. Scientists were also amazed by its unusual physical composition.

While white dwarfs are usually composed of helium and hydrogen, astronomers have been able to deal with an “almost pure helium atmosphere,” according to University of WarwickIt also detects the presence of sodium, lithium and potassium minerals. The “debris” came from “an ancient planetary system that survived the star’s evolution into a white dwarf.”

Read on

Earth is not unique

says Abigail Elms, Ph.D. student in Physics at University of Warwick And the Lead author of the journal In ScienceMonthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical SocietyIts “metal contamination”, as well as its “extremely cold surface temperature” and “aging” made it “extremely rare”.

In contrast, a slightly smaller “blue” star doesn’t seem so strange to scientists. Because he attracted planetary debris like that University of Warwick, which had a composition similar to that of the Earth’s crust. From this, as well as from the metallic contamination of the “red” star, astronomers made an important discovery.

This shows, as astronomer Elms puts it, “that our Earth is not unique.” “We found that the oldest stellar remnants in the Milky Way are polluted by planets that were once Earth-like. It is amazing that this happened over 10 billion years and that these planets died long before Earth formed.”

In the video: Strange image: NASA shares photo of the smiling sun