Submitting Campus
Daytona Beach
Department
Physical Sciences
Document Type
Article
Publication/Presentation Date
5-1-2010
Abstract/Description
We constrain the distribution of calcium across the surface of the white dwarf star G29-38 by combining time-series spectroscopy from Gemini-North with global time-series photometry from the Whole Earth Telescope. G29-38 is actively accreting metals from a known debris disk. Since the metals sink significantly faster than they mix across the surface, any inhomogeneity in the accretion process will appear as an inhomogeneity of the metals on the surface of the star. We measure the flux amplitudes and the calcium equivalent width amplitudes for two large pulsations excited on G29-38 in 2008. The ratio of these amplitudes best fits a model for polar accretion of calcium and rules out equatorial accretion.
Publication Title
The Astrophysical Journal
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/714/1/296
Publisher
Institute of Physics Publishing, Inc.
Scholarly Commons Citation
Thompson, S. E., von Hippel, T., & al., e. (2010). Pulsational Mapping of Calcium Across the Surface of a White Dwarf. The Astrophysical Journal, 714(1). https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/714/1/296
Additional Information
Dr. von Hippel was not affiliated with Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University at the time this paper was published.