An irish team of astronomers has found a star that is embedet in Zirkonium. A crystal most commonly used to produce fake-diamonds!

The star LS IV-14 116 is a relatively intermediate He-sdB star, also known to be a photometric variable.

Analysis of the spectrum shows LS IV-14 116 to have a temperature of 34000K and surface helium abundanc. This places the star slightly above the standard extended horizontal branch, as represented by normal sdB stars.

The magnesium and silicon abundances indicate the star to be metal poor relative to the Sun.

But a number of significant but unfamiliar absorption lines were identified as being due to germanium, strontium, yttrium and zirconium. After calculating oscillator strengths (for Ge, Y and Zr), the photospheric abundances of these elements were established to range from 3-4x  above solar standards.

The most likely explanation is that these overabundances are caused by radiatively-driven diffusion forming a chemical cloud layer in the photosphere. It is conjectured that this cloud formation could be mediated by a strong magnetic field.

Futhermore; At a distance of 4000light-years it is significantly brigther  than a normal sub-dwarf star, as its light sparkles in the fake diamond!

High-resolution blue-optical spectroscopy was obtained with the Anglo-Australian Telescope.

Source: arXiv