Join a team of astronomers as they discuss an exciting discovery of our time! Upon confirmation, they found the new brown dwarf, J1446B, orbiting a red dwarf star known as LSPM J1446+4633, roughly 4.3 times farther from us than our Sun. This particular brown dwarf has a mass approximately 60 times that of Jupiter. Its discovery is a major milestone in our understanding of these exotic bodies that exist in the space between stars and planets. The research describing this finding was published in The Astronomical Journal.
Brown dwarfs are fascinating objects, making up over half of our galaxy’s stellar population. What makes them unique is that they are too heavy to be planets but too light to shine themselves like normal stars. This special status enables them to act as important cosmological testbeds in the study of stellar formation and evolution. The discovery of J1446B dramatizes the importance of advanced observational techniques for astronomy.
The finding was facilitated by a unique combination of ground- and space-based observational data. The team utilized three complementary techniques: precise radial velocity measurements conducted with the InfraRed Doppler (IRD) on the Subaru Telescope, direct imaging at the W. M. Keck Observatory, and astrometric measurements performed by the Gaia spacecraft. This multi-faceted approach was key in allowing astronomers to closely characterize both the brown dwarf and its host star.
The six years of Subaru Telescope’s strategic program data (IRD-SSP) was extremely critical in this research. As a result, it offered very important details about the brown dwarf’s orbital properties. For the first time, Gaia-only data successfully constrained the orbit and determined the dynamical mass of J1446B, further solidifying its classification.
These results showed that J1446B undergoes brightness changes of at least 30%. This indicates that there are dynamic cloud processes or deep atmospheric circulation at work in its tempestuous atmosphere.
“Studying the weather on these distant objects not only helps us to understand how their atmospheres form, but also informs our larger search for life planets beyond the solar system.” – Taichi Uyama
M dwarfs, or red dwarfs, are known to be the most common type of star in the Milky Way galaxy. The discovery of J1446B not only sheds light on this particular brown dwarf but emphasizes the broader implications for understanding atmospheric phenomena in other celestial bodies.
