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By in
on Jul 10, 2012

An accretion disk in a binary system

An artists rendition of a white dwarf siphoning gas off a binary companion into a disk of material. The stolen gas spirals through the disk and eventually crashes on to the white dwarf surface. Credit: STScI

An artists rendition of a white dwarf siphoning gas off a binary companion into a disk of material.  The stolen gas spirals through the disk and eventually crashes on to the white dwarf surface. Credit: STScI

An accretion disk in a binary system