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  • KOI-3278: A Self-Lensing Bi...
    Kruse, Ethan; Agol, Eric

    Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science), 04/2014, Volume: 344, Issue: 6181
    Journal Article

    Over 40% of Sun-like stars are bound in binary or multistar systems. Stellar remnants in edge-on binary systems can gravitationally magnify their companions, as predicted 40 years ago. By using data from the Kepler spacecraft, we report the detection of such a "self-lensing" system, in which a 5-hour pulse of 0.1% amplitude occurs every orbital period. The white dwarf stellar remnant and its Sun-like companion orbit one another every 88.18 days, a long period for a white dwarf–eclipsing binary. By modeling the pulse as gravitational magnification (microlensing) along with Kepler's laws and stellar models, we constrain the mass of the white dwarf to be ∼63% of the mass of our Sun. Further study of this system, and any others discovered like it, will help to constrain the physics of white dwarfs and binary star evolution.