Other
Scientific paper
Dec 2006
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2006aas...20924106b&link_type=abstract
2007 AAS/AAPT Joint Meeting, American Astronomical Society Meeting 209, #241.06; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society,
Other
Scientific paper
We present Spitzer Space Telescope data on the non-mass transferring close binary system, NN Ser. Between 2002 and 2004 we measured a change in the orbital period of NN Ser with the ultra-fast, triple-beam CCD camera, ULTRACAM. We found that the rate of period change was consistent with an evolutionary rate of 2 orders of magnitude faster than expected from close binary evolutionary theory. We concluded that either the current theory of close binary evolution is flawed, there is an extra mechanism draining angular momentum from the binary system (probably in the form of a circumbinary disk), or the period change is due to a light-travel time effect caused by an orbiting third body. We therefore obtained Spitzer data in Aug 2006 to search for an infrared excess indicative of either a circumbinary disk or third body, and we have high-resolution HST observations scheduled for January. The Spitzer data show an infrared flux density in excess of that expected from the binary system components, but only at 4.5 and 8.0 microns. The 8.0 micron flux density can be easily modeled with a circumbinary disk, but cannot simultaneously match the 4.5 micron point without exceeding the measured flux density at 5.8 microns. This leads us to believe that there is another system component possibly a low mass companion in orbit around the binary system. If so, this raises the intriguing possibility that we have observed both a disk and a low-mass body in orbit around the same system, leading to the question of whether the disk is coalescing to form new planetary bodies, or whether an old planetary system is being destroyed by the tidal forces of the inner binary.
Brinkworth Carolyn
Hoard Donald Wayne
Marsh Thomas R.
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