Half of Sol Type Stars May Be Binary?!

In a new study, astronomers have concluded that half of all sun like stars are in a multiple star system.   This comes from scientists using  the upgraded Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array.   These conclusions from scientists that observed a previously unseen companion star.  

The standing theory as to how such a strange formation could have taken place is that the companion must have occurred as the primary star formed and then fractured into two separate bodies during formation.

John Tobin, of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory stated that:

• "This fits the theoretical model of companions forming from fragmentation in the disk"
• The new observations add to a growing body of evidence supporting the disk-fragmentation idea.  This showed that disks are present early in the star formation process, a necessity for binary pairs to form through disk fragmentation.

For more, read the complete Daily Galaxy article HERE

Also Science 2.0 for some detailed information HERE

Two Brown Dwarfs And An EXO!!

 

There is something very exciting going on only a little over six light years from Sol.  Two Brown Dwarfs in a binary orbit seem to be harboring an exoplanet.   Exciting point one....Brown Dwarfs and in a binary orbit.  

Brown Dwarf stars are a curious animal.  First for a star, they are tiny.  For the most part hardly larger than a gas giant planet, in Luhman 16AB case, astronomers determined that the mass of these brown dwarfs is about 40 times that of Jupiter,  but very much smaller than a star.  Plus they are miserly with their energy putting out mostly infrared energy, some even so cool that if you could stand in the gravity, you could walk on the surface for the most part barefoot.  

But to find two in a binary orbit is a bit rare.  Whats more, it would seem that there is a planet in the mix as well.  

Discovered by astronomers using NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) spacecraft, Luhman 16AB is threefold more interesting as this system is only 6.6 light years away from Earth.  If further investigation confirms the previous findings, Luhman 16AB's planet would be the closest exoplanet yet discovered. 

More available on the Dvice.com article HERE

Rare Binary White Dwarfs Discovered

I just read this killer article in the Daily Galaxy about white dwarf stars. To be precise a binary pair of white dwarfs that are orbiting each other once every 39 minutes! Oh wait, it gets weirder. In a few million years they will collide and merge to create a single star! Ok I hear the comments. So, you have a rare event here, but what is so strange about 2 stars colliding to make one?

To answer that we really should take a moment to figure out just what a white dwarf star really is. The Daily Galaxy article really does it best:

• White Dwarfs are among the oldest objects in the galaxy and are the remnants of the earliest phases of star formation. No bigger than the Earth, they are formed when a star like our Sun ends its life.

And weirder still:

• Out of the 100 billion stars in the Milky Way, only a handful of merging white dwarf systems are known to exist. The latest discovery will be the first of the group to merge AND be reborn.

That's right, two dead remains of long dead stars will combine to make a brand new star, not a bunch of junk from two dead stars... But you thought that it can't get any weirder? Oh my...we have only scratched the surface. Check this:

• The two white dwarfs orbit each other at a distance of 140,000 miles -- less than the distance from the Earth to the Moon. (Their orbital speeds reach upwards) of 270 miles per second or 1 million miles per hour!

Ok, now this is important.... in the normal stream of events, when two white dwarfs collide, the produce a super-nova. But and this is a big but...(ok, I know, I could have gone there but give me a little credit for not being juvenile 24/7) for a supernova to happen the mass must reach about 40% more than the mass of our sun. Now the binary system has one viable star which masses 17 percent of Sol and the second companion white dwarf weighs 43 percent. Now my high school math tells me that comes out to somewhere 60% or so. Instead of going boom, the new what....zombie star?... will begin fusing helium (which is the main element in the two dwarfs) and enter onto main sequence again, like a normal star.