Astronomers discover a rare 'black widow' binary, with the shortest orbit yet

MIT Astronomers Discover Mysterious “Black Widow” Binary System

The system, which may have originated near the center of the Milky Way, is orbited by a third stellar companion. The flashing of a nearby star has drawn MIT astronomers to a new and mysterious system 3,000 light-years from Earth. The strange stellar oddity appears to be a new “black widow binary”

Astronomers discover a rare 'black widow' binary, with the shortest orbit yet

Astronomers discovered a 'black widow binary' -- a rapidly spinning neutron star circling and slowly consuming a smaller companion star. Named ZTF J1406+1222, the pair has the shortest orbital period yet identified, and is unique in that it appears to host a third star that orbits around the two inner stars every 10,000 years.

Astronomers discover a rare 'black widow' binary, with the shortest orbit yet

The flashing of a nearby star has drawn MIT astronomers to a new and mysterious system 3,000 light years from Earth. The stellar oddity appears to be a new "black widow binary"—a rapidly spinning neutron star, or pulsar, that is circling and slowly consuming a smaller companion star, as its arachnid namesake does to its mate.

Astronomers discover a rare ’black widow’ binary, with the shortest orbit yet

The flashing of a nearby star drew the attention of a team of astronomers, who discovered that it is part of a rare and mysterious system. As they report in a paper published May 4 in Nature, the...