Did Astronomers Uncover An Unusual Star Melting A Moon?

Researchers believe they have uncovered the reason why a distant star is behaving erratically. In a new study, the researchers noted that the unusual star might be slowly consuming and melting an orbiting exomoon.

The star known as KIC 8462852 or Boyajian’s Star was first discovered in 2015. Since then, it has been baffling astronomers due to its odd behavior. As indicated in previous observations, the star erratically dims and re-brightens.

Recently, a team of researchers released a new study that could explain the star’s unusual behavior. According to the researchers, the star’s unpredictable brightness might be caused by the regular accumulation of debris in its surroundings.

The researchers explained that the debris could be coming from an exomoon, which is a moon that is outside the Solar System. As the exomoon orbits the star, the intense heat and radiation cause it to fall apart and melt.

“The exomoon is like a comet of ice that is evaporating and spewing off these rocks into space,” researcher and astrophysics professor Brian Metzger of the Columbia University said in a statement.

“Eventually the exomoon will completely evaporate, but it will take millions of years for the moon to be melted and consumed by the star,” he added. “We’re so lucky to see this evaporation event happen.”

Metzger and his team theorized that an alien planet with its own moon once orbited the Boyajian’s Star. However, for reasons yet to be determined, this planet was destroyed. Without the planet, the moon was easily pulled by the star into its orbit.

As a result, the moon was exposed to the high levels of radiation and heat from the star, causing it to evaporate and melt. The debris from the melting moon is then thrown into the star, causing it to irregularly brighten.

“We don’t really have any evidence that moons exist outside our solar system, but a moon being thrown off into its host star can’t be that uncommon,” Metzger explained. “This is a contribution to the broadening of our knowledge of the exotic happenings in other solar systems that we wouldn’t have known 20 or 30 years ago.

The study conducted by the researchers on the star was published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.