Astronomers Find Planets Around Weird Binary Star 69
The Bad Astronomer writes "Exoplanets orbiting binary stars have been discovered before, but NN Serpentis is a weird system even in that category. One star is a red dwarf in an incredibly tight orbit around a white dwarf. The white dwarf used to be a star like the Sun but became a red giant as it died, engulfing the red dwarf. Now the two orbit each other almost as closely as the Moon orbits the Earth. Explaining how the two newly detected exoplanets survived such an event is very difficult, and astronomers think they may have actually formed from the material expelled by the star as it died."
Re:bizarre choice of words. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Cue The Carbon-Based Life (Score:2, Funny)
Why don't we think of ants this way?
It would make it hard to justify not sharing your picnic...
Re:Reference-O-matic (Score:3, Funny)
Given that Red Dwarf is a TV show, and given that a red dwarf is a member of this weird binary system...would you like a piece of toast?
Re:The view must be nice (Score:5, Funny)
they're both dwarf stars.
Vertically challenged celebrities.