ROSAT makes classy finding.ROSAT ROSAT Roentgen Satellite , the German-U.S.-British satellite, has used its X-ray eyes to detect a new class of star, reports Joachim Trumper of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics The Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics is a Max Planck Institute, located in Garching, near Munich, Germany. In 1991 the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics in Garching, Germany. Dubbed dub 1 tr.v. dubbed, dub·bing, dubs 1. To tap lightly on the shoulder by way of conferring knighthood. 2. To honor with a new title or description. 3. supersoft sources, these stars -- about 15 of which ROSAT has detected in Andromeda and other nearby galaxies -- appear unusually bright in the light of very low energy X-rays, yet appear dim at higher energies. Trumper and others suggest that the stars are a type of white dwarf white dwarf, in astronomy, a type of star that is abnormally faint for its white-hot temperature (see mass-luminosity relation). Typically, a white dwarf star has the mass of the sun and the radius of the earth but does not emit enough light or other radiation to be -- long sought, yet never before detected -- that radiates low-energy X-rays 1,000 times more intensely than any other known white dwarf with a stellar partner. He speculates that the partners continously feed just enough mass to the dwarfs to trigger a slow, steady nuclear burning characteristic of the radiation detected by ROSAT. With too little mass, the dwarfs would undergo a series of staccato, high-energy surface explosions; too much mass, and the dwarfs would evolve into puffed-up stars called red giants, which also don't emit TO EMIT. To put out; to send forth, 2. The tenth section of the first article of the constitution, contains various prohibitions, among which is the following: No state shall emit bills of credit. many low-energy X-rays. |
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