{"paper":{"title":"Hot springs and dust reservoirs: JWST reveals the dusty, molecular aftermath of extragalactic stellar mergers","license":"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/","headline":"","cross_cats":["astro-ph.GA","astro-ph.HE"],"primary_cat":"astro-ph.SR","authors_text":"Hugo Tranin, Jacob E. Jencson, Kishalay De, Mansi Kasliwal, Marco A. Gomez-Munoz, Maxime Wavasseur, Melissa Shahbandeh, Nadejda Blagorodnova, Ryan M. Lau, Viraj Karambelkar","submitted_at":"2025-08-05T21:51:30Z","abstract_excerpt":"We present James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) observations of four Luminous Red Novae (LRNe): dusty, extragalactic transients from stellar mergers following common-envelope evolution (CEE) in massive binary stars. Our targets - AT2021blu, AT2021biy, AT2018bwo, and M31-LRN-2015 - span a broad range in progenitor primary masses ($\\approx$3-24M$_{\\odot}$) and post-merger ages ($\\approx$1100-3700 days). All four were observed with the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) from 5-25$\\mu$m; AT2021blu and AT2021biy additionally have 5-12$\\mu$m spectra from the Low-Resolution Spectrometer. These spectra show "},"claims":{"count":0,"items":[],"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"source":{"id":"2508.03932","kind":"arxiv","version":1},"verdict":{"id":null,"model_set":{},"created_at":null,"strongest_claim":"","one_line_summary":"","pipeline_version":null,"weakest_assumption":"","pith_extraction_headline":""},"integrity":{"clean":true,"summary":{"advisory":0,"critical":0,"by_detector":{},"informational":0},"endpoint":"/pith/2508.03932/integrity.json","findings":[],"available":true,"detectors_run":[],"snapshot_sha256":"c28c3603d3b5d939e8dc4c7e95fa8dfce3d595e45f758748cecf8e644a296938"},"references":{"count":0,"sample":[],"resolved_work":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57","internal_anchors":0},"formal_canon":{"evidence_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"author_claims":{"count":0,"strong_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"builder_version":"pith-number-builder-2026-05-17-v1"}