Question: Have you discover any Theoretical Astrophysics?

Miriam Hogg answered on 8 Nov 2018:

I haven’t discovered anything new, but I have explored something that is predicted and made some guesses about it.

So there are some stars that aren’t alone, they have another star with them and the orbit each other. These star systems are called binaries (there are other names with systems with more than two stars in). When stars get old and run out of fuel they grow into a giant stars and then shed their outer layers and shrink into a ‘white dwarf’ which is the core of the star and is all that’s left after the giant stage.

When you have a binary system one star will run out of fuel before the other and will become a giant and then a white dwarf. In its giant stage the other star can steal some of the mass as the giant loses it. This mass normally forms a little disc.

There is a new theory that this disc of material can form new planets. (Our current theories believe that planets form at the same time as the star from the same material so these would be very new, young planets around old stars). I used this theory and looked at how stars might steal material from each other as they grow old and made a guess about how many planets might form.

spoiler: not very many but enough that we might be able to see some if we looked at enough old stars.

I have recently started another project that looks at these white dwarfs and how their evolution might have affected the planets and asteroids around them.