Related papers: Refining our knowledge of the white dwarf mass-rad…
Observational tests of the white dwarf mass-radius relationship have always been limited by the uncertainty in the available distance measurements. Most studies have focused on Balmer line spectroscopy because these spectra can be obtained…
Sirius B is the nearest and brightest of all white dwarfs, but it is very difficult to observe at visible wavelengths due to the overwhelming scattered light contribution from Sirius A. However, from space we can take advantage of the…
The main goal of this work was to measure the masses and radii of white dwarfs that belong to widely separated, common proper motion binaries with non-degenerate companions. These can be assessed, independently from theoretical mass-radius…
Measuring the mass-radius relation of individual white dwarfs is an empirically challenging task that has been performed for only a few dozen stars. We measure the white dwarf mass-radius relation using gravitational redshifts and radii of…
We present a detailed spectroscopic and photometric analysis of 219 DA and DB white dwarfs for which trigonometric parallax measurements are available. Our aim is to compare the physical parameters derived from the spectroscopic and…
Einstein's theory of General Relativity predicts that the light from stars will be gravitationally shifted to longer wavelengths. We previously used this effect to measure the mass of the white dwarf Sirius B from the wavelength shift…
The white dwarf mass-radius relationship is fundamental to modern astrophysics. It is central to routine estimation of DA white dwarf masses derived from spectroscopic temperatures and gravities. It is also the basis for observational…
The mass-radius relation of white dwarfs is largely determined by the equation of state of degenerate electrons, which causes the stellar radius to decrease as mass increases. Here we observationally measure this relation using the…
Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky and, despite its proximity, this binary system still imposes intriguing questions about its current characteristics and past evolution. Bond et. al. (arXiv:1703.10625) published decades of…
We present high precision, model independent, mass and radius measurements for 16 white dwarfs in detached eclipsing binaries and combine these with previously published data to test the theoretical white dwarf mass-radius relationship. We…
We present the equation of state for two classes of new ultralight particles, a scalar field coupling to electrons and a light $\mathbb{Z}_\mathcal{N}$ QCD axion field coupling to nucleons. Both are potential candidates for dark matter.…
We have imaged seventeen recently discovered Sirius-like binary systems with HST/WFPC2 and resolved the white dwarf secondary in eight cases. Most of the implied orbital periods are of order several hundred years, but in three cases (56…
We use the ESPRESSO spectrograph at the Very Large Telescope to measure velocity shifts and gravitational redshifts of eight bona fide Hyades white dwarfs, with an accuracy better than 1.5 percent. By comparing the gravitational redshift…
This paper aims to provide an introduction to the problem of determining the mass-radius relationship for white dwarfs. Both Newtonian and general relativistic case are examined, electromagnetic interactions are considered and the problem…
Models predict that the well-studied mass-radius relation of white dwarf stars depends on the temperature of the star, with hotter white dwarfs having larger masses at a given radius than cooler stars. In this paper, we use a catalog of…
Mass estimates of white dwarfs via electromagnetic methods, often differ from those obtained through gravitational redshift measurements, in some cases with discrepancies ranging in $5-15\%$ across independent datasets. Although many of the…
Unlike gravitational waves from merging black holes and neutron stars that chirp significantly over the observational period of ground-based detectors, gravitational waves from binary white dwarfs are almost monochromatic. This makes it…
Astrometric observations of resolved binaries provide estimates of orbital periods and will eventually lead to measurement of dynamical masses. Only a few very low mass star and brown dwarf masses have been measured to date, and the…
The masses of compact objects like white dwarfs, neutron stars and black holes are fundamental to astrophysics, but very difficult to measure. We present the results of an analysis of subluminous B (sdB) stars in close binary systems with…
We discuss the feasibility of using astrophysical observations of white dwarfs as probes of fundamental physics. We quantify the effects of varying fundamental couplings on the white dwarf mass-radius relation in a broad class of…