Paper:	Fossil Fields in Magnetic White Dwarfs
Volume:	334, 14th European Workshop on White Dwarfs
Page:	153
Authors:	Wickramasinghe, D.T.; Ferrario, L.
Abstract:	Magnetic white dwarfs with fields greater than ≈ 106 G form ≈ 10% of all white dwarfs and exhibit a mass distribution with a mean mass of ≈ 0.93MSolar compared to ≈ 0.58MSolar for all white dwarfs. We investigate two possible explanations for these observations. First, that the Initial-Final Mass Relationship is influenced by the presence of a magnetic field and that the observed high field white dwarfs originate from stars on the Main Sequence that are recognised as magnetic (the chemically peculiar A and B stars). Second, that the Initial-Final Mass Relationship is essentially unaffected by the presence of a magnetic field, and that the magnetic white dwarfs have progenitors that are not restricted to this groups of stars. In either scenario, the magnetic fields of the high field magnetic white dwarfs could be fossil remnants from the Main Sequence phase consistent with magnetic flux conservation.

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