When the Stars Align: A 5 σ Concordance of Planetary Nebulae Major Axes in the Centre of our Galaxy
arXiv:2307.07140 · doi:10.3847/2041-8213/acdbcd
Abstract
We report observations of a remarkable major axes alignment nearly parallel to the Galactic plane of 5σ significance for a subset of bulge "planetary nebulae" (PNe) that host, or are inferred to host, short period binaries. Nearly all are bipolar. It is solely this specific PNe population that accounts for the much weaker statistical alignments previously reported for the more general bulge PNe. It is clear evidence of a persistent, organised process acting on a measurable parameter at the heart of our Galaxy over perhaps cosmologically significant periods of time for this very particular PNe sample. Stable magnetic fields are currently the only plausible mechanism that could affect multiple binary star orbits as revealed by the observed major axes orientations of their eventual PNe. Examples are fed into the current bulge planetary nebulae population at a rate determined by their formation history and mass range of their binary stellar progenitors.
arXiv comment12 pages, 6 figures, 2 tables, matches version published in ApJL
References in corpus (28)
- SciPy 1.0--Fundamental Algorithms for Scientific Computing in Python
- emcee: The MCMC Hammer
- The NumPy array: a structure for efficient numerical computation
- The Astropy Project: Building an inclusive, open-science project and status of the v2.0 core package
- Theory of Star Formation
- Secular Evolution and the Formation of Pseudobulges in Disk Galaxies
- Common Envelope Evolution: Where we stand and how we can move forward
- Chemical evolution of the Galactic bulge as traced by microlensed dwarf and subgiant stars. V. Evidence for a wide age distribution and a complex MDF
- The Origin and Shaping of Planetary Nebulae: Putting the Binary Hypothesis to the Test
- emcee v3: A Python ensemble sampling toolkit for affine-invariant MCMC
- Planetary nebulae seen with TESS: Discovery of new binary central star candidates from Cycle 1
- The impact of magnetic fields on single and binary star formation
- Chemical evolution of the Galactic bulge as traced by microlensed dwarf and subgiant stars. VI. Age and abundance structure of the stellar populations in the central sub-kpc of the Milky Way
- Binary Planetary Nebulae Nuclei towards the Galactic Bulge. I. Sample Discovery, Period Distribution and Binary Fraction
- Binary stars as the key to understanding planetary nebulae
- Evidence for a Weak Galactic Center Magnetic Field from Diffuse Low Frequency Nonthermal Radio Emission
- Binarity and the abundance discrepancy problem in planetary nebulae
- Confirmation of the link between central star binarity and extreme abundance discrepancy factors in planetary nebulae
- Accelerated post-AGB evolution, initial-final mass relations, and the star-formation history of the Galactic bulge
- Ultraviolet Properties of Primeval Galaxies: Theoretical Models from Stellar Population Synthesis
- Effect of Angular Momentum Alignment and Strong Magnetic Fields on the Formation of Protostellar Disks
- Bipolar planetary nebulae from common envelope evolution of binary stars
- Binary Central Stars of Planetary Nebulae Identified With Kepler/K2
- Towards a more complete sample of binary central stars of planetary nebulae with Gaia
- Alignment of the Angular Momentum Vectors of Planetary Nebulae in the Galactic Bulge
- Wide binaries in Planetary Nebulae with Gaia DR2
- Morphologies and Central Stars of Planetary Nebulae in the Galactic bulge from VLT, and Pan-STARRS imaging
- On the alignment of PNe and local magnetic field at the galactic centre: MHD numerical simulations