Mark A. Garlick's Space-Art.Co.Uk

Planet of a Double Star

In this image I imagine a rocky world in orbit around a pair of stars, one yellow like the Sun and one a harsh blue. This image appeared in Universe: Journey into Deep Space, by Mike Goldsmith and myself....

Keywords: binary star, star, landscape, Earth-like, surface...

Algol

Algol, also known as Beta Persei in the constellation Perseus, is the prototype of a class of interacting binary stars which differ from cataclysmic binaries. It was the first eclipsing binary ever found. Viewed from Earth, Algol varies its brightnes...

Keywords: binary, binary star, Algol, accretion, Beta Persei, eclipsing binary, star...

Animation of a Cataclysmic Binary

This video shows an interacting binary star system known as a cataclysmic variable (CV) or cataclysmic binary. The larger star is a red dwarf, a normal and very common star somewhat smaller, cooler and fainter than the Sun. It is in orbit around a mu...

Keywords: cataclysmic, accretion, accretion disc, red dwarf, white dwarf, star, binary sta...

Aurora Planet

This is the view from a planet in a close orbit around a magnetic flare star. These stars have such gigantic episodes of magnetic activity that they must have huge starspots, some of which have actually been imaged. Life on a nearby planet would be i...

Keywords: flare, star, magnetic, starspot, landscape, aurora, exoplanet, planet...

Be X-Ray Binary

Here is a different kind of x-ray binary. In the foreground (top) is a hot star called a Be star. It spins so quickly that it is surrounded by a circumstellar disc of matter, flung off via centrifugal force. The Be star is in orbit around a tiny and ...

Keywords: x-ray binary, accretion, accretion disc, black hole, blue giant, stellar wind, s...

Binary Sunset

In this image I imagine an Earth-like world in orbit around not a single star but a close binary. What beautiful sunsets could be witnessed from this world. In the sky I have added a giant satellite, its night side illuminated by cities, betraying in...

Keywords: exoplanet, terrestrial planet, planet, water, ocean, binary star, star, satellit...

Blues for a Dead World

Here you have an impression of a high-mass x-ray binary (HMXB), in which a blue giant (right) orbits a compact object such as a neutron star or black hole. The blue giant has a powerful stellar wind, shown radiating outwards here. Some of this materi...

Keywords: x-ray binary, landscape, blue giant, star, black hole, neutron star, stellar win...

Cataclysm VI

A cataclysmic binary is a close-binary star system consisting of red dwarf (bottom) in orbit around a white dwarf. The proximity of the latter and its powerful gravity distorts the red dwarf. It gas flows away from it and plunges towards and around t...

Keywords: cataclysmic, accretion, accretion disc, red dwarf, white dwarf, star, binary sta...

Cataclysmic Dawn

This is the same kind of binary star system (a cataclysmic variable) as depicted Cataclysm III and VI this time seen from a cave on a purely hypothetical, watery and rocky planet. Admittedly, though, such a situation is highly unlikely to exist in re...

Keywords: cataclysmic, accretion, accretion disc, red dwarf, white dwarf, star, binary sta...

Cosmic Blast

A giant star, reaching the inevitable end of its fuel supply, explodes in a tremendous explosion – brighter than a hundred billion stars – called a supernova. The force from the blast throws the remains of the star deep into space, where they wil...

Keywords: supernova, planet, satellite, star, exoplanet, terrestrial planet, nebula...