Zombie Stars, ones that returns from being dead
Zombie Star is a kind of star that is created when a star explodes in a Type 1ax supernova, but the star isn't obliterated. Instead, the star matter doesn't completely disperse. A star remains. The remaining star is referred to as a zombie star.
The zombie star can become a Vampire Star by consuming fuel and energy from a nearby star to revive itself. It gets its name from the supernatural creation where the monster has died but comes back alive to feast on the living.
Zombie stars tend to appear in binary star systems. The Zombie star was once the bigger of the two stars but was consumed by the more massive star and shrunk to become a white dwarf. The star can come back from the dead even though it's a dead white dwarf star. The Zombie Star can suck back hydrogen from its nearby Vampire star, thereby becoming a vampire star itself. When the Zombie star gets roughly the size of a planet, it can go supernova and destroy the original vampire star. Ref: Zombie Stars
Zombie stars don't just feed off stars. Zombie stars can, in the case of W.D. 1145+017 in the constellation of Virgo, feast on the energy and materials of its extrasolar planets that orbit the star. Scientists discovered that there were six objects in orbit, each with a comet like tail which indicated that something was not right. The star had noticeably heavier materials than the dwarf star, which should have sunk inside the star. The only possible reason was that the metals were being refreshed in a vampirical way. Ref: A.B.C.
Zombie Star Examples
Potential Zombie Star in NGC1301
Zombie Stars are not limited to our galaxy. They have been found elsewhere in the Universe. The picture from N.A.S.A. is of a potential zombie star that is located in another galaxy NGC 1301 in the constellation of Eridanus, the river. The picture taken from the hubble space telescope showed what the area was like in both 2005/6 and 2013/ You can see how it brightened up over some time. The star is located about 110 million Light Years away. Given the time that light takes to travel, the incident would have taken place millions of years ago, about the time of the dinosaurs. Ref: NASA/ESA
iPTF14hls, The Zombie Star that doesn't die
You might think that a Zombie Star might die once, and that'll be the end of it. iPTF14hls in the constellation of Ursa Major in the northern hemisphere is a star that has exploded more than once. The star is located 156 million parsecs from our solar system, so there's no cause for concern about its explosions.
Last Modified : January 2025
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