Using the TESS exoplanet-hunting space telescope, astronomers have found a binary star system where an object erratically spews thick, light-blocking dust.
This is likely the result of an orbiting body that emits clouds of dust. While the pulsations of the system are regular, the blockages of light caused by the dust are erratic in their shape, size, depth, and duration.
"It is somewhat rare to see an eclipse obscuring this much of a star's light, especially from a body that is not solid," Powell said."What is particularly notable about the behavior of this system is that the eclipse does not always occur, but when it occurs, it is strictly periodic. Suspects for this dust production suggested in the paper include regular collisions between bodies orbiting the stars or an object disintegrating around the stars as the heat causes material to change rapidly from solid to gas—a process called sublimation.
The discovery of this mysterious dust-spewing object adds to a list of wonderous and remarkable cosmic objects contained in TIC, including objects resulting from stellar pulsations, shocks from supernovae, disintegrating planets, and much more.