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2w ago

Astronomers Confirm First Coronal Mass Ejection From a Star Beyond the Sun

LOFAR radio observations with XMM-Newton context provided the unambiguous signature of an extreme red-dwarf eruption with planet-stripping potential.

This artist’s impression shows a coronal mass ejection (CME) around another star. We see these eruptions coming often from the Sun. During a CME, massive amounts of material are flung out from our star, flooding the surrounding space. These dramatic expulsions shape and drive space weather, such as the dazzling auroras we see on Earth, and can chip away at the atmospheres of any nearby planets.
An artist's illustration depicts the XMM-Newton observatory in space.
Star Explosion

Overview

  • The peer-reviewed finding, published November 12 in Nature, identifies a CME from the red dwarf StKM 1-1262 roughly 130 light-years away.
  • Researchers detected a shock-driven radio burst using LOFAR after deploying a new data-processing method, then used XMM-Newton measurements to place the event in context.
  • The ejected material traveled at about 2,400 kilometers per second, a speed reached by only a tiny fraction of solar CMEs, and the event was unusually dense.
  • The star’s rapid rotation and strong magnetic field—estimated at roughly 20 times faster and about 300 times stronger than the Sun’s—likely enabled the powerful eruption.
  • Scientists say such events could erode or strip atmospheres from close-in exoplanets around active M dwarfs, sharpening habitability concerns and motivating further surveys.