IISc simulations suggest strong magnetic fields can enable super-Chandrasekhar white dwarfs

Researchers at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, and collaborators reported simulation results indicating that strong internal magnetic fields could allow some white dwarfs to grow beyond the ~1.4-solar-mass Chandrasekhar limit. In one simulation, they found a magnetised carbon-oxygen white dwarf reaching about 2.4 times the Sun’s mass; the study was published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.