Helium burning white dwarf found

Most of the time when it is described what stars burn it is touted for hydrogen. White dwarfs can explode into supernovas. However, a team headed bu Jochen Greiner has detected a white dwarf binary that develops and emits what is called super-soft X-rays. Ordinarily there is hydrogen that burn off the surface. In this new case, it is found that helium is the overflow.

The Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE) in Garching, Germany with X-rays detected the slow glow in the Large Magellanic Cloud. It is released by the University of Bonn It is an optical source that shows helium originating from the accretion disk from another companion.  This is not considered common for white dwarfs. It is noted also that the helium can burn at lower accretion rates. It is also notable because white dwarfs are considered a major source for producing iron in the universe.

The new white dwarf will be dubbed [HP99] 159.