New triple star system sets shortest orbital period record

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Professional and amateur astronomers have made a groundbreaking discovery with the help of artificial intelligence, identifying a unique triple star system named TIC 290061484. This stellar trio was uncovered through cosmic "strobe lights" observed by NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS).

TIC 290061484 features a pair of twin stars that orbit each other every 1.8 days, along with a third star that orbits the duo in just 25 days. This remarkable finding breaks the previous record for the shortest outer orbital period in such systems, which was established in 1956 with a third star orbiting an inner pair in 33 days.

"Thanks to the compact, edge-on configuration of the system, we can measure the orbits, masses, sizes, and temperatures of its stars," said Veselin Kostov, a research scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California. "And we can study how the system formed and predict how it may evolve."

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