Optical detection of the 1.1-day variability at the white dwarf GD 394 with TESS

TL;DR

This study reports the first optical detection of the 1.146-day flux variation in white dwarf GD 394 using TESS, confirming previous EUVE findings and exploring potential physical causes for the variability.

Contribution

First optical detection of GD 394's variability with TESS, confirming EUVE results and providing new insights into its physical mechanisms.

Findings

Detected 0.12% flux variation with 1.146-day period

Confirmed EUVE variability in optical wavelengths

Discussed possible physical explanations for the variability

Abstract

Recent discoveries have demonstrated that planetary systems routinely survive the post-main sequence evolution of their host stars, leaving the resulting white dwarf with a rich circumsteller environment. Among the most intriguing of such hosts is the hot white dwarf GD 394, exhibiting a unique $1.150\pm0.003$ d flux variation detected in Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer (EUVE) observations in the mid 1990s. The variation has eluded a satisfactory explanation, but hypotheses include channeled accretion producing a dark spot of metals, occultation by a gas cloud from an evaporating planet, or heating from a flux tube produced by an orbiting iron-cored planetesimal. We present observations obtained with the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) of GD 394. The space-based optical photometry demonstrates a $0.12\pm0.01$ % flux variation with a period of $1.146\pm 0.001$ d, consistent with the EUVE period and the first re-detection of the flux variation outside of the extreme ultraviolet. We describe the analysis of the TESS light curve and measurement of the optical variation, and discuss the implications of our results for the various physical explanations put forward for the variability of GD 394.