Sentences with phrase «as the white dwarf accretes»
As the white dwarf accretes material from the nearby star, it's possible that could explode as a type la supernova.
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The white dwarf accretes material from the companion star, then at some point, it might explode as a type Ia supernova.
Building on past observations of the white dwarf called SDSSJ1043 +0855 (the dead core of a star that originally was a few times the mass of the Sun), which has been known to be gobbling up rocky material in its orbit for almost a decade, the team used Keck Observatory's HIRES instrument fitted to the 10 - meter Keck I telescope as well as data from the Hubble Space Telescope to measure and characterize the material being accreted by the star.
«Spectroscopic observations of the white dwarf allowed us to measure the abundances of the rocky material as it is being accreted and filtered through the star's atmosphere in real time,» Melis said.
If the white dwarf accretes enough material to reach the Chandrasekhar limit, the maximum mass of a stable white dwarf star (1.4 solar mass), it will likely explode as a Type Ia supernova.