Habitable

White Dwarfs Could Be More Habitable Than We Thought

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The researchers created synthetic spectra for both Kepler-62 and the white dwarf based on what is known about both. This image shows the spectral energy distribution of the modelled WD with an effective temperature of 5000 K (red) and a synthetic spectrum of Kepler-62 (4859 K, purple). Image Credit: Shields et al. 2025.

White dwarfs are the remnants of once brilliant main sequence stars like our Sun. They’re extremely dense and no longer perform any fusion. The light they radiate is from remnant heat only. Astronomers have doubted that white dwarfs could host habitable planets, partly because of the tumultuous path they follow to become white dwarfs, but … Read more