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Stellar astrophysics

Shrouded in a dusty disk

Nature volume 464, pages 842–843 (2010)Cite this article

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For more than a century, the binary star system ε Aurigae has been a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma. But no more — the system's previously inferred but unseen disk of dust has been detected.

The first direct images of the large dark disk component of the bright eclipsing binary system ε Aurigae during eclipse are reported on page 870 of this issue by Kloppenborg et al.1. These observations mark a turning point in the study of this mysterious, long-period (about 27.1 years) binary system, and represent a leap forward in our understanding of a system that has long puzzled astronomers.

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Figure 1: Artist's concept of the binary star ε Aurigae.

NASA/JPL— CALTECH

References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Edward Guinan is in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Villanova University, Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085, USA. edward.guinan@villanova.edu,

    Edward Guinan

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  1. Edward Guinan
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Guinan, E. Shrouded in a dusty disk. Nature 464, 842–843 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/464842a

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