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Warm water vapour in the sooty outflow from a luminous carbon star

Ivison, R. J.; Blommaert, J. A. D. L.; Olofsson, G. +34 more

The detection of circumstellar water vapour around the ageing carbon star IRC +10216 challenged the current understanding of chemistry in old stars, because water was predicted to be almost absent in carbon-rich stars. Several explanations for the water were postulated, including the vaporization of icy bodies (comets or dwarf planets) in orbit ar…