redOrbit - April 5, 2013 - By Staff
Image Caption: This artist's concept depicts a dense, dead star called a white dwarf crossing in front of a small, red star. The white dwarf's gravity is so great it bends and magnifies light from the red star. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
NASA’s Kepler space telescope has observed the effects of a dead star bending the light of its companion star, one of the first detections of this phenomenon in double star systems.
The dead star, known as a white dwarf, is the burnt-out core of what used to be a star much like our sun. It is locked in an orbiting pattern with its partner, a small “red dwarf” star, which is physically larger than the tiny white dwarf but has less mass.
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