Related papers: Discovery of three self-lensing binaries from Kepl…

We examine the light curves of two quasars, motivated by recent suggestions that a supermassive black hole binary (SMBHB) can exhibit sharp lensing spikes. We model the variability of each light curve as due to a combination of two…

As the descendants of stars with masses less than 8 M$_{\odot}$ on the main sequence, white dwarfs provide a unique way to constrain planetary occurrence around intermediate-mass stars (spectral types BAF) that are otherwise difficult to…

We present a preliminary analysis of the cool pulsating white dwarf GD 1212, enabled by more than 11.5 days of space-based photometry obtained during an engineering test of the two-reaction-wheel-controlled Kepler spacecraft. We detect at…

We present photometry and spectroscopy for 27 pulsating hydrogen-atmosphere white dwarfs (DAVs, a.k.a. ZZ Ceti stars) observed by the Kepler space telescope up to K2 Campaign 8, an extensive compilation of observations with unprecedented…

We present the discovery of a binary system containing a white dwarf candidate using data from the LAMOST. Our analysis of the radial velocity data allowed us to determine an orbital period of approximately 0.953 days and a mass function of…

We report the discovery of SDSS~J022932.28+713002.7, a nascent extremely low-mass (ELM) white dwarf (WD) orbiting a massive ($> 1\,M_\odot$ at 2$\sigma$ confidence) companion with a period of 36 hours. We use a combination of spectroscopy,…

Finding pulsars in binaries are important for measurements of the masses of neutron stars, for tests of gravity theories, and for studies of star evolution. We are carrying out the Galactic Plane Pulsar Snapshot survey (GPPS) by using the…

First results are presented for a Hubble Space Telescope Advanced Camera for Surveys snapshot study of white dwarfs with likely red dwarf companions. Of 48 targets observed and analyzed so far, 27 are totally or partially resolved into two…

We present 594 radial velocity measurements for 71 white dwarfs obtained during our search for binary white dwarfs and not reported elsewhere. We identify three excellent candidate binaries, which require further observations to confirm our…

We examine recent studies on the formation rate of planetary nebulae and find this rate to be about one-third of the formation rate of white dwarfs. This implies than only about one-third of all planetary nebulae that evolve to form white…

We present an analysis of flare activity in wide binary stars using a combination of value-added data sets from the NASA Kepler mission. The target list contains a set of previously discovered wide binary star systems identified by proper…

A fraction of Galactic stars have compact companions which could be white dwarfs (WDs), neutron stars (NSs) or stellar-mass black holes (SBHs). In a detached and edge-on binary system including a main-sequence star and a compact object…

The study of extra-solar planetary systems has emerged as a new discipline of observational astronomy in the past few years with the discovery of a number of extra-solar planets. The properties of most of these extra-solar planets were not…

In recent years, approximately 150 low-mass white dwarfs (WDs), typically with masses below 0.4 solar masses, have been discovered. Observational evidence indicates that most of these low-mass WDs are found in binary systems, supporting…

We obtained high-speed photometry of the disintegrating planetesimals orbiting the white dwarf WD1145+017, spanning a period of four weeks. The light curves show a dramatic evolution of the system since the first observations obtained about…

We present 2271 radial velocity measurements taken on 118 single-line binary stars, taken over eight years with the CORALIE spectrograph. The binaries consist of F/G/K primaries and M-dwarf secondaries. They were initially discovered…

We present the spectroscopic orbits of eleven nearby, mid-to-late M dwarf binary systems in a variety of configurations: two single-lined binaries (SB1s), seven double-lined binaries (SB2s), one double-lined triple (ST2), and one…

We report the discovery of 42 white dwarfs in the original Kepler mission field, including nine new confirmed pulsating hydrogen-atmosphere white dwarfs (ZZ Ceti stars). Guided by the Kepler-INT Survey (KIS), we selected white dwarf…

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…

An XMM-Mewton observation performed in May 2008 has confirmed that the 13 seconds pulsations in the X-ray binary HD 49798/RX J0648.0-4418 are due to a rapidly rotating white dwarf. From the pulse time delays induced by the 1.55 days orbital…