NASA's IXPE Unlocks White Dwarf X-ray Secrets: How a Dead Star Still Feeds

• NASA's IXPE observed EX Hydrae, a white dwarf in a binary system, for nearly a week in 2024, marking the first peer-reviewed paper using IXPE data.
• White dwarfs are dense stellar cores, similar in size to Earth but with the Sun's mass, formed after exhausting hydrogen fuel.
• EX Hydrae is an intermediate polar, where its magnetic field partially channels gas from a companion star, leading to both circling and pole-bound flow.
• As matter falls, it heats to millions of degrees Fahrenheit, forming X-ray emitting columns above the white dwarf's surface.
• IXPE's polarimetry measured these accretion columns at nearly 2,000 miles high, providing new insights into extreme stellar environments and energetic binary systems.

Why It Matters: IXPE's observations of EX Hydrae reveal how white dwarfs feed and behave in extreme binary systems.