Articles tagged with Brown Dwarfs
The discovery of an exomoon in the CD-35 2722 system, orbiting a brown dwarf rather than a planet, challenges our understanding of planetary objects. The exosatellite is estimated to be at least as massive as Jupiter and orbits a highly massive companion, blurring the lines between stars, planets, and moons.
The James Webb Space Telescope has captured the first direct evidence of salt clouds in a cold object's atmosphere, surrounding the 'Pink Planet' GJ504b. The discovery provides insights into the composition and formation of this ancient, rosy-hazed world, which is too faint for ground-based telescopes.
Researchers believe a gigantic ring system surrounding a brown dwarf or super-Jupiter could have blocked the star's light, causing an extremely rare fading star phenomenon. The dimming lasted nearly 200 days, making it one of the longest ever observed.
A brown dwarf companion, J1446B, has been found orbiting a nearby M dwarf star, LSPM J1446+4633. The discovery uses a synergy of ground- and space-based observatories, including Subaru's IRD instrument and the Gaia mission, to determine the dynamical mass and orbital parameters of the brown dwarf with unprecedented accuracy.
Astronomers detected phosphine in the atmosphere of a cool, ancient brown dwarf named Wolf 1130C using the James Webb Space Telescope. The discovery challenges previous theories and suggests that phosphorus chemistry might be more complex than initially thought.
Astronomers discovered a greedy white dwarf star consuming its closest celestial companion at an unprecedented rate. The study found that the super-dense white dwarf is burning brightly due to the mass transfer between the two stars, potentially leading to a massive explosion visible from Earth.
Astronomers used Gemini South and James Webb Space Telescope to detect silane in ancient brown dwarf's atmosphere, revealing how primordial formation impacts planet atmospheres. The discovery confirms understanding of gas giant cloud formation and offers insight into the composition of distant worlds.
Astronomers have identified an extremely rare hierarchical quadruple star system consisting of a pair of cold brown dwarfs orbiting two young red dwarf stars. The discovery provides a unique cosmic laboratory for studying these mysterious objects, which are too big to be considered planets but also lack the mass to be full-fledged stars.
Researchers propose 'dark dwarfs' could be key to understanding dark matter, with lithium-7 serving as a unique marker. A discovery of a dark dwarf would provide compelling evidence for WIMPs as a possible dark matter component.
A team of researchers has found a planet orbiting at a 90-degree angle around a pair of young brown dwarfs, marking the first time such strong evidence for a 'polar planet' orbit is collected. The discovery was made possible by pioneering data analysis that improved precision by a factor of 30.
Two new celestial objects have been confirmed using Gaia data, including a Super-Jupiter exoplanet and a brown dwarf. The discovery challenges current theories of planet formation and provides valuable data for understanding these intriguing objects. Gaia's ongoing mission will uncover hundreds of planets and brown dwarfs around nearby...
The team used observations from NEID and two other spectrographs to confirm one system hosting a giant planet and another with a brown dwarf. Gaia-4b has an orbital period of 570 days, mass of 12 Jupiter masses, and orbits a star 64% the mass of the Sun.
The final data release from NASA's NEOWISE mission encompasses over 26 million images and nearly 200 billion sources detected by the telescope. The new images showcase the full-sky coverage of the survey, revealing previously unseen regions of cosmic dust where stars are born.
A new study using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has confirmed the presence of proplyds around brown dwarfs in the Orion Nebula. The team discovered 20 cool objects that are too small and cool to undergo hydrogen fusion, with two faint proplyds detected by Hubble previously.
Astronomers at Caltech have discovered that the well-studied brown dwarf Gliese 229B is actually a pair of tightly orbiting brown dwarfs weighing about 38 and 34 times the mass of Jupiter. This resolves the long-standing mystery about its dimness.
A team of astronomers discovered a planetary system that resembles the sun-Earth system, with an Earth-size companion in an orbit twice as large as Earth's today. The discovery provides insight into the evolution of main sequence stars and their impact on planets.
The James Webb Space Telescope has identified six likely rogue worlds, including the lightest ever found with a dusty disk around it. These objects offer insights into how stars and planets form, suggesting that gas giants can form in disks around young stars.
For the first time, a team of French scientists has observed brown dwarfs orbiting very close to bright stars using precise astronomical imaging. The findings provide new insights into the formation of these unusual celestial objects and massive exoplanets.
Researchers led by Jackie Faherty detected methane gas and temperature inversions on W1935, a cold brown dwarf. The findings suggest possible aurorae similar to those on Jupiter and Saturn, possibly due to an active moon.
Astronomers have identified a tiny, free-floating brown dwarf with only three to four times the mass of Jupiter using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. The discovery provides clues about the star-formation process and helps better understand exoplanets.
Astronomers used NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to identify the new record-holder: a tiny, free-floating brown dwarf with only three to four times the mass of Jupiter. The discovery provides clues about the star-formation process at very small masses and sheds light on the properties of exoplanets.
A team of researchers has detected ammonia isotopologues in the atmosphere of a cold brown dwarf, providing new clues to understanding gas giant formation. The ratio of two isotopologues reveals that the exoplanet formed through gravitational collapse, challenging traditional theories.
Researchers have discovered the coldest star yet to produce emission at radio wavelengths, with a surface temperature of 425 degrees centigrade. The ultracool brown dwarf is a rare find, as most do not emit radio waves due to their dynamics.
Researchers have imaged a double-lobed structure resembling Jupiter's radiation belts around an ultracool dwarf, revealing the presence of high-energy electrons trapped in its magnetic field. This discovery provides a new method for assessing the shapes of magnetic fields on brown dwarfs and exoplanets.
Astronomer Frank Kiwy uses Astro Data Lab to discover 34 new ultracool dwarf binary systems in the Sun's neighborhood, expanding knowledge of brown dwarfs and their companions. The discovery nearly doubles previously known samples, shedding light on how often brown dwarfs have companions.
Researchers have directly imaged four new brown dwarfs orbiting stars from far away, significantly advancing our understanding of these enigmatic objects. The study utilized a novel approach combining space and ground-based facilities to detect hidden companions.
A team of astronomers has discovered a rare pair of brown dwarfs that have the widest separation of any brown dwarf binary system found to date. The two brown dwarfs are about 12 billion miles apart, or three times the separation of Pluto from the Sun.
A team of researchers has discovered a new object orbiting a Sun-like star that was missed by previous searches. The object is estimated to be between 10 and 20 times the mass of Jupiter and is thought to be a large planet or a small brown dwarf.
Researchers detect lithium in brown dwarfs for the first time, providing new constraints on thermonuclear burning masses. The discovery of Reid 1B, a 41Jupiter-mass object with 13,000 times more lithium than Earth's surface, sheds light on the behavior of these substellar objects.
Researchers use Keck Observatory's MOSFIRE instrument to analyze the layer-cake structure of a nearby free-floating brown dwarf's atmosphere. The study reveals complex cloud formations, including hot sand grains and exotic elements, with depths reaching up to 446 miles.
Three rapidly rotating brown dwarfs were discovered spinning around their axes once every hour, reaching speeds of about 350,000 kilometers per hour. This extreme rotation rate is ten times faster than Jupiter and poses a risk to the stability of these objects.
A team of astronomers has created the most complete 3D map of cool brown dwarfs in the Sun's local neighborhood, cataloging over 500 objects including 38 new discoveries. The results provide evidence that the Sun's immediate neighborhood is unusually diverse relative to other parts of the Milky Way Galaxy.
A University of Arizona-led research team discovered bands and stripes on the closest brown dwarf to Earth, hinting at processes churning its atmosphere. The findings reveal high-speed winds running parallel to equators, mixing atmospheres and redistributing heat.
Researchers have discovered a binary system of brown dwarfs, orbiting each other at an unprecedented distance, with one object being similar in mass to Jupiter and the other about 8 times less massive. This rare find suggests that star formation processes can create binary systems like those found in our solar system on smaller scales.
A team of astronomers has discovered the first cold brown dwarf using radio observations from the LOFAR telescope and Gemini North. The object, BDR J1750+3809, is a close cousin of Solar System planets like Jupiter and can be used to test theories predicting exoplanet magnetic fields.
Astronomers using NSF's NOIRLab facilities and citizen science project Backyard Worlds have discovered approximately 100 cool brown dwarfs near the Sun, with several of these worlds approaching Earth's temperature. These discoveries provide new insights into the formation and atmospheres of planets beyond our Solar System.
Researchers have discovered the closest young brown dwarf with a disk that could potentially host planets, located just 332 light-years from Earth. The brown dwarf, named W1200-7845, is estimated to be 3.7 million years old and sits within a moving group of stars.
A new study has measured wind speeds on a brown dwarf using infrared and radio emissions, revealing strong winds of up to 2,400 kilometers per hour. The technique can be adapted to characterize atmospheres of exoplanets with similar rotation rates and periodic variability.
Researchers have successfully measured wind speed on a brown dwarf, an object intermediate in mass between a planet and a star. The study found that the brown dwarf's atmosphere is rotating faster than its interior, with a calculated wind speed of about 1425 miles per hour.
Astronomers detected velocities of both brown dwarfs in a system orbiting each other, confirming the hypothesis that 2M1510 is composed of two brown dwarfs. The discovery provides rare data on the mass, radius, and age of brown dwarfs, allowing for verification of theoretical models.
Researchers discovered a rare eclipsing binary brown dwarf system using the SPECULOOS project, confirming theoretical models of brown dwarfs' cooling processes and providing valuable insights. The system consists of two brown dwarfs orbiting each other, offering opportunities to study their atmospheres and climates.
Two brown dwarfs, one about 34 times the mass of Jupiter and the other about 72 times the mass, are found to be linked despite being 341 astronomical units apart. The discovery confirms that brown dwarf systems can be very low-mass and extremely far apart yet connected.
The James Webb Space Telescope will study the smallest, faintest residents of NGC 1333, distinguishing between objects that form like stars and those that form like planets. The team aims to identify cluster members as puny as Jupiter for the first time ever, shedding light on their origins and the star formation process.
The study suggests that massive planets form through slow material accumulation, while brown dwarfs come about due to rapid gravitational collapse. The discovery advances the idea of bottom-up planet formation and highlights the differences in planetary systems beyond our own.
A new study analyzing 300 stars finds that Jupiter-like gas giants congregate between 3 and 10 astronomical units from their stars. This 'sweet spot' is where most large planets are found, peaking in occurrence rate around 3-10 AU.
The Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 project re-launches with a call to volunteer citizen scientists to discover planets and brown dwarfs in the outer reaches of the Solar System. Citizen scientists have already discovered over 1,000 cold nearby brown dwarfs using images from NASA's WISE mission.
A volunteer astronomer has found an ancient white dwarf star with multiple dust rings, forcing researchers to reconsider planetary system models. The discovery challenges current understanding of how planetary systems evolve and could provide insights into the distant future of our solar system.
An international team of astrophysicists has identified the first-ever merger of white and brown dwarf stars, with the debris left behind exhibiting unusual chemical compositions and organic molecules. The discovery sheds new light on the origin of a mysterious star observed by French monk Père Dom Anthelme in 1670.
Researchers confirm collision of white dwarf and brown dwarf stars using ALMA observations. The debris from the explosion reveals the presence of lithium and unusual element isotopes.
Astronomers have detected a strong magnetic field in a planetary-mass object beyond our Solar System, similar to Jupiter's but over 200 times stronger. The object is believed to be a free-floating planet, only 12.7 times more massive than Jupiter, and has a surface temperature of about 825 degrees Celsius.
Scientists have found a new exoplanet, 2MASS 0249 c, that is nearly identical to the well-studied gas-giant planet beta Pictoris b. The two planets share similar mass, brightness, and spectrum but differ in their formation environments, with one orbiting a bright star and the other a pair of faint brown dwarfs.
Brown dwarfs, larger cousins of giant planets, undergo atmospheric changes as they age and cool. Astronomers measured the temperature at which this shift happens in young brown dwarfs, finding it occurs around 1,150 degrees kelvin for objects 150 million years old.
Brown dwarfs blur the line between stars and planets, making their formation a puzzle. The James Webb Space Telescope will study specific brown dwarfs to gain insight into star formation and exoplanet atmospheres.
A study using the W. M. Keck Observatory measured the spin rates of three planetary-mass companions, finding rates similar to those of small free-floating brown dwarfs, suggesting two possibilities: the companions could be brown dwarfs or planets that formed with similar spins
A NASA-funded citizen science project has discovered a new brown dwarf, a major milestone in the search for a distant planet. The object, WISEA J110125.95+540052.8, was identified by amateur astronomer Rosa Castro and her fellow volunteers through the Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 project.
An international team of astronomers suggests that the Milky Way contains a staggering number of brown dwarfs, with estimates ranging from 25 to 100 billion. The Substellar Objects in Nearby Young Clusters (SONYC) survey found that brown dwarfs are common in dense star clusters and have a small effect on their formation environment.
A team of citizen scientists using a new tool discovered a previously unknown brown dwarf, about 100 light years away from the Sun. The object was confirmed via an infrared telescope and published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.
A team of researchers discovered that SIMP J013656.5+093347 is a planetary mass object, rather than a brown dwarf, due to its mass being at the boundary between brown dwarf-like and planet-like properties. This finding offers new insights into the atmospheres of gas giant exoplanets.
Scientists have identified a brown dwarf with a composition of over 99.99% hydrogen and helium, making it the most massive known to date. The discovery sheds light on the possibility of an undiscovered population of extremely pure brown dwarfs in our galaxy's ancient past.
New research on brown dwarfs has found that atmospheric properties may be behind their incredible variation in size, temperature, chemistry, and more. The discovery may also apply to planets outside the solar system, making brown dwarfs a valuable tool for studying exoplanet evolution.