Astronomers Kathryn F. Neugent and Philip Massey have made an exciting discovery in the Andromeda galaxy. Using the Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT), they detected 19 new Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars, which are extremely hot and luminous stars at an advanced stage of evolution. This brings the total number of known WR stars in Andromeda to around 150. The researchers used improved imaging data and spectroscopic follow-up to confirm the new discoveries. The newly detected WR stars are generally fainter than the previously known ones, but their finding provides valuable insights into the population of WR stars in Andromeda and the evolution of massive stars overall. The astronomers are planning to continue their survey to identify more WR stars and gain a better understanding of their evolution.
https://phys.org/news/2023-06-nineteen-wolf-rayet-stars-andromeda-galaxy.html