Description of J0240+1952
- Name : LAMOST J024048.51+195226.9 or J0240+1952
- Location : constellation of Aries
- Distance : 2,016 light-years away
- Category : White Dwarf
- Subcategory : Magnetic Propeller White Dwarf
- White dwarf star’s rotation period : 24.93 seconds
- Discovery : University of Warwick astronomer Ingrid Pelisoli and team
About White Dwarf
White dwarf stars are billions of years older observable celestial objects and offer to tell us a lot about the universe’s past. White dwarfs are stars with a high density that have burnt up all of the hydrogen they formerly utilized as nuclear fuel.
Benefit of White Dwarf Studies
Astronomers have previously tried to explain Einstein’s theory of relativity by observing frame-dragging, in which spacetime is affected by huge spinning objects
About Black Dwarf
A stellar remnant, such as a white dwarf, cools enough over billions of years to become a black dwarf, which releases no substantial heat or light energy (completed burning hydrogen and helium fuel) and is virtually impossible to see since it emits no radiation.
Chandrasekhar Limit
Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, a Nobel Laureate in Physics, proposed the Chandrasekhar Limit, which is the theoretical maximum mass for a stable white dwarf star. A threshold that states that no white dwarf may have a mass more than 1.4 times that of the Sun, and that any degenerate structure with a mass greater than that must eventually collapse into a black hole or neutron star.
AE Aquarii vs J0240+1952
J0240+1952 is comparable to another rapid white dwarf, AE Aquarii, that has a spin rate of 33 seconds, and they’re the only two propeller white dwarf stars that have been identified so far.
Red Dwarf > Blue Dwarf > White Dwarf
Due to their efficiency, red dwarfs will burn through their entire supply of hydrogen, becoming hotter and smaller before transforming into blue dwarfs and eventually ending their lives as white dwarfs.
LAMOST J0240+1952
A white dwarf’s rotation usually takes hours or days, but the newly discovered J0240+1952 star in the Aries constellation rotates incredibly quickly thanks to a nearby red dwarf star that is feeding gas into LAMOST J0240+1952. At about 3000 kilometers per second, the white dwarf is sucking gaseous plasma from a close partner star and throwing it into space and it is part of a binary star system.
LAMOST J0240+1952 develops magnetic field
J0240+1952 is a cataclysmic variable star that has sucked up enough material from its red dwarf companion in the past to give it a significant rotation speed boost. The white dwarf then developed a magnetic field that acts as a barrier that repels the inbound plasma, constantly throwing most of it out into space.
Article Reference and Image Credit : University of Warwick
