RAS PN09/33 (NAM20): EMBARGOED UNTIL 00:01 BST, WEDNESDAY 22ND APRIL 2009
Issued by:
Dr. Robert Massey
Press and Policy Officer
Royal Astronomical Society
Tel: +44 (0)20 7734 3307 / 4582
Mob: +44 (0)794 124 8035
E-mail: rm@ras.org.uk
And
Anita Heward
Press Officer
Royal Astronomical Society
Mob: +44 (0)7756 034 243
E-mail: anitaheward@btopenworld.com
EWASS meeting press room (20th – 23rd April only)
Tel: +44 (0)1707 285530 +44 (0)1707 285640
+44 (0)1707 285781 +44 (0)1707 285587
EWASS home page: http://www.jenam2009.eu
EWASS press page: http://www.star.herts.ac.uk/ewass/press
RAS home page: http://www.ras.org.uk
ASTRONOMERS DISCOVER YOUNGEST AND LOWEST MASS DWARFS
Astronomers
have found three brown dwarfs with estimated masses of less than 10
times that of Jupiter, making them among the youngest and lowest mass
sub-stellar objects detected in the solar neighbourhood to date.
The
observations were made by a team of astronomers working at the
Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de l'Observatoire de Grenoble (LAOG),
France, using the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT). Andrew
Burgess will be presenting the discovery at the European Week of
Astronomy and Space Science at the University of Hertfordshire,
Hatfield, on Wednesday 22nd
April.
The
dwarfs were found in a star forming region named IC 348, which lies
almost 1000 light years from the Solar System towards the
constellation of Perseus. This cluster is approximately 3 million
years old – extremely young compared to our 4.5 billion year old
Sun – which makes it a good location in order to search for the
lowest mass brown dwarfs. The dwarfs are isolated in space, which
means that they are not orbiting a star, although they are
gravitationally bound to IC 348. Their atmospheres all show evidence
of methane absorption which was used to select and identify these
young objects.
"There has been some controversy about identifying young, low mass brown dwarfs in this region. An object of a similar mass was discovered in 2002, but some groups have argued that it is an older, cooler brown dwarf in the foreground coinciding with the line of sight. The fact that we have detected three candidate low-mass dwarfs towards IC 348 supports the finding that these really are very young objects," said Burgess.
The team set out to find a population of these brown dwarfs in order to help theoreticians develop more accurate models for the distribution of mass in a newly-formed population, from high mass stars to brown dwarfs, which is needed to test current star formation theories. The discovery of the dwarfs in IC 348 has allowed them to set new limits on the lowest mass objects.
”Finding
three candidate low-mass dwarfs towards IC 348 backs up predictions
for how many low-mass objects develop in a new population of stars.
Brown dwarfs cool with age and current models estimate that their
surfaces are approximately 900-1000 degrees Kelvin (about 600-700
degrees Celsius). That’s extremely cool for objects that have just
formed, which implies that they have the lowest masses of any of this
type of object that we’ve seen to date,” said Burgess.
IMAGES
Images can be found at: http://www.caelumobservatory.com/gallery/n1333abtp.shtml
Annotated image showing star-forming region in IC348
http://www.ras.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1607
NOTES FOR EDITORS
The study was carried out by Andrew Burgess, Estelle Moraux and Jerome Bouvier of the Formation Stellaire et Planétaire, Naines Brunes group at the Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de l'Observatoire de Grenoble (LAOG), France.The observations were obtained with
WIRCam, a joint project of CFHT, Taiwan, Korea, Canada, France, at
the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) which is operated by the
National Research Council (NRC) of Canada, the Institute National des
Sciences de l'Univers of the Centre National de la Recherche
Scientifique of France, and the University of Hawaii. This work was
supported in part by the European Commission Sixth Framework
Programme Marie Curie Research Training Network CONSTELLATION
(MCRTN-2006-035890).
CONTACTS
Andrew Burgess
Laboratoire
d'Astrophysique
Observatoire de Grenoble
Grenoble,
France
Tel : +33 4 76 63 58 40
E-mail : aburgess@obs.ujf-grenoble.fr
Andrew Burgess can be contacted through the EWASS press office from Monday 20th to Thursday 23rd April.