TY  - JOUR
A1  - Reindl, Nicole
A1  - Rauch, Thomas
A1  - Miller Bertolami, Marcelo Miguel
A1  - Todt, Helge Tobias
A1  - Werner, K.
T1  - Breaking news from the HST
BT  - the central star of the Stingray Nebula is now returning towards the AGB
JF  - Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
N2  - SAO 244567 is a rare example of a star that allows us to witness stellar evolution in real time. Between 1971 and 1990, it changed from a B-type star into the hot central star of the Stingray Nebula. This observed rapid heating has been a mystery for decades, since it is in strong contradiction with the low mass of the star and canonical post-asymptotic giant branch (AGB) evolution. We speculated that SAO 244567 might have suffered from a late thermal pulse (LTP) and obtained new observations with Hubble Space Telescope (HST)/COS to follow the evolution of the surface properties of SAO 244567 and to verify the LTP hypothesis. Our non-LTE spectral analysis reveals that the star cooled significantly since 2002 and that its envelope is now expanding. Therefore, we conclude that SAO 244567 is currently on its way back towards the AGB, which strongly supports the LTP hypothesis. A comparison with state-of-the-art LTP evolutionary calculations shows that these models cannot fully reproduce the evolution of all surface parameters simultaneously, pointing out possible shortcomings of stellar evolution models. Thereby, SAO 244567 keeps on challenging stellar evolution theory and we highly encourage further investigations.
KW  - stars: AGB and post-AGB
KW  - stars: atmospheres
KW  - stars: evolution
Y1  - 2016
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1093/mnrasl/slw175
SN  - 0035-8711
SN  - 1365-2966
VL  - 464
SP  - L51
EP  - L55
PB  - Oxford Univ. Press
CY  - Oxford
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Hajduk, Marcin
A1  - Todt, Helge Tobias
A1  - Hamann, Wolf-Rainer
A1  - Borek, Karolina
A1  - van Hoof, Peter A. M.
A1  - Zijlstra, Albert A.
T1  - The cooling-down central star of the planetary nebula SwSt 1
BT  - a late thermal pulse in a massive post-AGB star?
JF  - Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
N2  - SwSt 1 (PN G001.5-06.7) is a bright and compact planetary nebula containing a late [WC]-type central star. Previous studies suggested that the nebular and stellar lines are slowly changing with time. We studied new and archival optical and ultraviolet spectra of the object. The [O III] 4959 and 5007 angstrom to H beta line flux ratios decreased between about 1976 and 1997/2015. The stellar spectrum also shows changes between these epochs. We modelled the stellar and nebular spectra observed at different epochs. The analyses indicate a drop of the stellar temperature from about 42 kK to 40.5 kK between 1976 and 1993. We do not detect significant changes between 1993 and 2015. The observations show that the star performed a loop in the H-R diagram. This is possible when a shell source is activated during its post-AGB evolution. We infer that a late thermal pulse (LTP) experienced by a massive post-AGB star can explain the evolution of the central star. Such a star does not expand significantly as the result of the LTP and does not became a born-again red giant. However, the released energy can remove the tiny H envelope of the star.
KW  - stars: AGB and post-AGB
KW  - stars: atmospheres
KW  - stars: evolution
KW  - planetary
KW  - nebulae: general
KW  - planetary nebulae: individual: SwSt1
Y1  - 2020
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa2274
SN  - 0035-8711
SN  - 1365-2966
VL  - 498
IS  - 1
SP  - 1205
EP  - 1220
PB  - Oxford Univ. Press
CY  - Oxford
ER  -