Abstract

As stars like the Sun evolve into white dwarfs, their planetary systems do not simply fade into quiescence. Many white dwarfs retain unmistakable signatures of surviving asteroids and planets, revealed through photospheric metal pollution and compact circumstellar debris disks. These relics give us a rare opportunity to study the long-term dynamical evolution of planetary material, long after the main sequence has ended. In this talk, I will explore two complementary aspects of this picture. First, I will discuss the role of wide stellar companions in delivering planetary material onto white dwarfs. I will then present new results from a survey of infrared variability in dusty white dwarf debris disks, using the full Spitzer and WISE archives to trace ongoing dynamical activity within these compact systems—a dataset that provides a valuable legacy resource for constraining future models of white dwarf debris disks.