HM Cancri: Binary Star With Shortest Known Orbital Period

Tuesday, March 9, 2010 - 11:50 in Astronomy & Space

A team of astronomers writing in Astrophysical Journal Letters has shown that the two stars in the binary HM Cancri revolve around each other in a mere 5.4 minutes, making HM Cancri the binary star with by far the shortest known orbital period. It is also the smallest known binary; The system is no larger than 8 times the diameter of the Earth. The team was able to prove the short binary period of the system by detecting the velocity variations in the spectral lines in the light of HM Cancri. These velocity variations are induced by the Doppler effect, caused by the orbital motion of the two stars revolving around each other. The Doppler effect causes the lines to periodically shift from blue to red and back. read more

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