Our Sun is a loner. It lacks a stellar companion hurtling through interstellar space with it. But we’ve known for a long time that’s actually relatively rare – most stars have at least one gravitationally bound partner. Understanding how exactly those stars are related to each other is critical for observational campaigns – especially for those of exoplanets. So a new paper from researchers at the University of Madrid that categorizes almost every star within ten light years into companion categories is a welcome addition to the literature on the subject, and could be used to inform the next round of planet habitable planet hunting satellites.
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