Free Astronomy Magazine November-December 2025

24 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2025 ASTRO PUBLISHING I n our nearby stellar neighbour- hood, a burned-out star is snack- ing on a fragment of a Pluto-like object. With its unique ultraviolet capability, only the NASA/ESA Hub- ble Space Telescope could identify that this meal is taking place. The stellar remnant is a white dwarf about half the mass of our Sun, but that is densely packed into a body about the size of Earth. Scientists think the dwarf’s immense gravity pulled in and tore apart an icy Pluto analogue from the system’s own ver- White dwarf eats chunk of Pluto-like object by NASA/ESA Bethany Downer T his artist’s concept shows a white dwarf surrounded by a large debris disc. Debris from pieces of a cap- tured, Pluto-like object is falling onto the white dwarf. [T. Pyle (Caltech, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory)]