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White Dwarfs are Primary Source of Carbon in Milky Way, Astronomers Say | Astronomy - Sci-News.com
Jul 07, 2020 52 secs

Some are in favor of low-mass stars that blew off their carbon-rich envelopes by stellar winds became white dwarfs, and others place the major site of carbon’s synthesis in the winds of massive stars that eventually exploded as supernovae.

The relationship between the initial masses of stars and their final masses as white dwarfs is known as the initial-final mass relation, a fundamental diagnostic integrates information from the entire life cycles of stars.

The analysis of white dwarfs observed by the team gave a surprising result: the masses of these stars were notably larger than expected, putting a ‘kink’ in the initial-final mass relation for stars with initial masses in a certain range.

“Our study interprets this kink in the initial-final mass relationship as the signature of the synthesis of carbon made by low-mass stars in the Milky Way,” Dr.

Analyzing the initial-final mass relation around the kink, the researchers concluded that stars bigger than 2 solar masses also contributed to the Galactic enrichment of carbon, while stars of less than 1.5 solar masses did not.

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