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feelingbutter t1_iu1et9a wrote

I would think that planets around white dwarfs would have had a bad time when those stars became white dwarfs.

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lughnasadh OP t1_iu1jcgs wrote

>>I would think that planets around white dwarfs would have had a bad time when those stars became white dwarfs.

True, but they remain stable (albeit much cooler/smaller) for billions of years afterwards. I assume they are looking for life that might have evolved after the star's red giant phase.

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Aanar t1_iu68upt wrote

Wouldn't the orbits of any planets that would be in the habitable zone of a white dwarf had been within the radius of it during it's red giant phase? That would leave only the native planets that somehow migrated inward or where captured from elsewhere.

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