Related papers: The CHARA Array resolves the long-period Wolf-Raye…
Classical Wolf-Rayet stars are the descendants of massive OB stars that have lost their hydrogen envelopes and are burning helium in their cores prior to exploding as type Ib/c supernovae. The mechanisms for losing their hydrogen envelopes…
Classical Wolf-Rayet stars are descendants of massive OB-type stars that have lost their hydrogen-rich envelopes, and are in the final stages of stellar evolution, possibly exploding as type Ib/c supernovae. It is understood that the…
Wolf-Rayet stars represent one of the final stages of massive stellar evolution. Relatively little is known about this short-lived phase and we currently lack reliable mass, distance, and binarity determinations for a representative sample.…
We report the first results from deep X-ray observations of the Wolf-Rayet binary system WR147 with the Chandra HETG. Analysis of the zeroth order data reveals that WR147 is a double X-ray source. The northern counterpart is likely…
WR 137 (HD 192641) is a binary system consisting of a carbon-rich Wolf-Rayet star and an Oe companion star in a 13-year orbit. Near periastron, the winds of the two stars collide and form carbonaceous dust. We obtained three mid-infrared…
This paper discusses our ongoing efforts to characterize dust-enshrouded Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars in the radio and infrared. We have used the Very Large Array to measure the broadband radio spectrum of WR stars in suspected binary systems and…
We present the first visual orbit for the nitrogen-rich Wolf-Rayet binary, WR 133 (WN5o + O9I) based on observations made with the CHARA Array and the MIRC-X combiner. This orbit represents the first visual orbit for a WN star and only the…
We analyze new high-resolution Chandra X-ray images of the Wolf-Rayet binary system WR147. This system contains a WN8 star with an early-type companion located 0.6'' to its north, and is the only known early-type binary with a separation on…
Context. Massive-binary evolution models predict that some systems will go through an evolutionary phase where the original primary has become a supernova and left a compact object behind that then orbits a Wolf-Rayet (hereafter, WR) star.…
Several long-period binaries with a carbon-rich Wolf-Rayet star and an O star produce dust in their wind collisions. In eccentric binaries, this is seen most strongly near periastron passage. The exact conditions leading to dust creation…
Binaries that host a carbon-rich Wolf-Rayet (WC) star and an OB-type companion can be copious dust producers. Yet the properties of dust, particularly the grain size distribution, in these systems remain uncertain. We present Band 6…
Massive colliding-wind binaries that host a Wolf-Rayet (WR) star present a potentially important source of dust and chemical enrichment in the interstellar medium (ISM). However, the chemical composition and survival of dust formed from…
An X-ray study of a deeply embedded Wolf-Rayet star WR 121a has been carried out using long-term (spanning over ~12 years) archival observations from Chandra and XMM-Newton. For the first time, a periodic variation with a period of 4.1 days…
Some carbon-rich Wolf-Rayet stars (WC stars) show an infrared excess from dust emission. Dust forms in the collision of the WC wind with a companion star's wind. As this dust is carried towards the ISM at close to the WCd wind speed and the…
We present an overview of recent X-ray observations of Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars with XMM-Newton and Chandra. A new XMM spectrum of the nearby WN8 + OB binary WR 147 shows hard absorbed X-ray emission, including the Fe K-alpha line complex,…
A combined mid-IR spectrum of five colliding-wind, massive, dust-producing Population I Wolf-Rayet (WR) binaries shows a wealth of absorption and emission details coming from the circumstellar dust envelopes, as well as from the…
Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are evolved massive stars with strong fast stellar winds. WR stars in our Galaxy have shown three possible sources of X-ray emission associated with their winds: shocks in the winds, colliding stellar winds, and…
Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are evolved massive stars, presumably on their way to becoming supernova. They are characterized by high luminosities and fast and dense stellar winds. We have detected signs of a radio continuum pinwheel associated…
Accumulating evidence points to a binary nature for the Wolf-Rayet ([WC]) central stars, a group that constitutes about 15% of all central stars of planetary nebula. From ISO observations, a dual dust chemistry (oxygen- and carbon-rich) has…
We present high-resolution infrared (2--18 micron) images of the archetypal periodic dust-making Wolf-Rayet binary system WR140 (HD 193793) taken between 2001 and 2005, and multi-colour (J -- [19.5]) photometry observed between 1989 and…