English

The Evidence for a Binary origin of the Young Planetary Nebula HB 12

Astrophysics 2008-11-26 v1

Abstract

The young planetary nebulae play an important role in stellar evolution when intermediate- to low-mass stars (0.8 \sim 8 M_\odot) evolve from the proto-planetary nebulae phase to the planetary nebulae phase. Many young planetary nebulae display distinct bipolar structures as they evolve away from the proto-planetary nebulae phase. One possible cause of their bipolarity could be due to a binary origin of its energy source. Here we report our detailed investigation of the young planetary nebula, Hubble 12, which is well-known for its extended hourglass-like envelope. We present evidence with time-series photometric observations the existence of an eclipsing binary at the center of Hubble 12. Low-resolution spectra of the central source show, on the other hand, absorption features such as CN, G-band & Mg b\arcsec{\arcsec}, which can be suggestive of a low-mass nature of the secondary component.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0603224,
  title  = {The Evidence for a Binary origin of the Young Planetary Nebula HB 12},
  author = {Chih Hao Hsia and Wing Huen Ip and Jin Zeng Li},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0603224},
  year   = {2008}
}

Comments

9 pages, 11 figures, Accepted for publication in AJ