| Abstract |
Planetary Nebulae represent a powerful window into the evolution of low-intermediate mass stars that have undergone extensive mass-loss. The nebula manifests itself in an extremely wide variety of shapes, but exactly how the mass lost is shaped into such a diverse range of morphologies is still highly uncertain despite over thirty years of vigorous debate. The most natural explanation involves the presence of a couple of stars at the centre of the Planetary Nebula, and it is their dramatic interaction that leads to the magnificent showcases. Notwithstanding their interest per se, the known close binary central stars of Planetary Nebulae (CSPN) are also important to study as they constitute the likely progenitors of cataclysmic variables, post-CE white dwarf main-sequence binaries, and, perhaps, Type Ia supernovae. I will provide an overview of why such binary CSPN offer a rich, untapped pool of objects “just out of the oven” to study the late stages of binary stellar evolution, and in particular, the very poorly known common-envelope interaction, and give a few examples of systems of interest our team is currently studying. With these observations, we may be witnessing a paradigm shift that will perhaps lead to the discovery that only binary stars form planetary nebulae. |
