Variable dust formation by the colliding-wind Wolf-Rayet system HD 36402 in the Large Magellanic Cloud


P. M. Williams (1), Y.-H. Chu (2), R. A. Gruendl (2), M. A. Guerrero (3)

(1) Institute for Astronomy, Royal Observatory, Edinburgh, (2) Department of Astronomy, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, (3) Instituto de Astrofisica de Andalucia, Granada

Infrared photometry of the probable triple WC4(+O?)+O8I: Wolf-Rayet system HD 36402 (= BAT99-38) in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) shows emission characteristic of heated dust. The dust emission is variable on a time-scale of years, with a period near 4.7 yr, possibly associated with orbital motion of the O8 supergiant and the inner P ~ 3.03-d WC4+O binary. The phase of maximum dust emission is close to that of the X-ray minimum, consistent with both processes being tied to colliding wind effects in an elliptical binary orbit. It is evident that Wolf-Rayet dust formation occurs also in metal-poor environments.

Reference: arXiv:1302.2002 [astro-ph.SR]
Status: Manuscript has been accepted

Weblink: http://arxiv.org/abs/1302.2002

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Email: pmw@roe.ac.uk