Caltech scientists discovered a bizarre two-faced white dwarf star, named Janus, possibly caused by magnetic fields. One side of its surface is composed primarily of hydrogen, while the other side is helium. The white dwarf’s rotation has been sped up, but normally, it takes 15-minutes to rotate around its axis.
When white dwarfs are formed, their heavier elements typically sink to their cores, while lighter elements float to the top. As the white dwarfs cool over time, the materials are thought to mix together. In rare cases, the hydrogen is mixed into the interior and diluted, resulting in helium becoming more prevalent.
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The surface of the white dwarf completely changes from one side to the other. When I show the observations to people, they are blown away. Not all, but some white dwarfs transition from being hydrogen- to helium-dominated on their surface. We might have possibly caught one such white dwarf in the act,” said Ilaria Caiazzo, a postdoctoral scholar at Caltech.
