Dwarf Star ‘has all the ingredients’ for life

Scientists have discovered a star 200 light-years from Earth that may hold the building blocks for life.

The white dwarf star spotted in the constellation Boötes has an atmosphere rich in carbon and nitrogen, and even the ingredients for water.

Researchers say the planetary system tied to this star could be much like our own solar system, suggesting that some of the components that give rise to life are not all that uncommon.

Scientists have discovered a star 200 light-years from Earth that may hold the building blocks for life. Researchers observed the star using the Keck Telescope in 2008 and 2014, and the Hubble Space Telescope in 2014
Scientists have discovered a star 200 light-years from Earth that may hold the building blocks for life. Researchers observed the star using the Keck Telescope in 2008 and 2014, and the Hubble Space Telescope in 2014. The study, led by scientists at the University of California, Los Angeles, focused on a star known as WD 1425+540. Researchers observed the star using the Keck Telescope in 2008 and 2014, and the Hubble Space Telescope in 2014.

Then, they analyzed the chemical composition of the atmosphere with a spectrometer.  They discovered that a minor planet orbiting the white dwarf had experienced a change in its trajectory. According to the team, this could have been caused by the gravitational pull of another planet in the system.

As a result, the minor planet travelled too close to the star and was ripped apart by the strong gravitational field, tearing it apart into gas and dust. These remnants then went into orbit around the white dwarf – like the rings around Saturn – and ultimately spiralled into the star itself.

And, they brought the building blocks for life with them. The team discovered carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and hydrogen in the white dwarf’s atmosphere.

‘The findings indicate that some of life’s important preconditions are common in the universe,’ said co-author Benjamin Zuckerman, a UCLA professor of astronomy.

According to the researchers, the events likely occurred in the past 100,000 years ago. The team estimates that roughly 30 percent of the minor planet’s mass was water and other ices, while 70 percent was made of rocky material. This minor planet could be the first of many analogs to objects in our Kuiper Belt – a cluster of small objects in the outer edges of the solar system.

Researchers it’s the first time nitrogen has been found in a white dwarf, and one of just a few examples where such a star has been impacted by a rocky body rich in water ice.

The white dwarf star spotted in the constellation Boötes has an atmosphere rich in carbon and nitrogen, and even the makings for water

The white dwarf star spotted in the constellation Boötes has an atmosphere rich in carbon and nitrogen, and even the makings for water These dense stars are the remnants of normal stars, and their strong gravitational pull causes elements to sink out of their atmosphere and into their interior, hidden from telescopes.

‘If there is water in Kuiper belt-like objects around other stars, as there now appears to be, then when rocky planets form they need not contain life’s ingredients,’ said lead author Siyi Xu, a postdoctoral scholar at the European Southern Observatory in Germany.

‘Now we’re seeing in a planetary system outside our solar system that there are minor planets where water, nitrogen and carbon are present in abundance, as in our solar system’s Kuiper belt.

‘If Earth obtained its water, nitrogen, and carbon from the impact of such objects, then rocky planets in other planetary systems could also obtain their water, nitrogen, an carbon this way.’

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