Artist’s View of Watery Asteroid in White Dwarf Star System GD 61

This is an artist's impression of a rocky and water-rich asteroid being torn apart by the strong gravity of the white dwarf star GD 61. Similar objects in our solar system likely delivered the bulk of water on Earth and represent the building blocks of the terrestrial planets.

About the data

The image was created from Hubble data from proposal 12474 : B. Gänsicke (University of Warwick), D. Koester (University of Kiel), J. Farihi (University of Cambridge), and J. Girven (University of Warwick).

The science team includes: J. Farihi (University of Cambridge), B. Gänsicke (University of Warwick), and D. Koester (University of Kiel).