Related papers: Benchmark ultra-cool dwarfs in widely separated bi…
We present observations of a new very low mass field binary, discovered during an infrared imaging survey of 250 DENIS L and very late-M dwarfs. DENIS-J055146.0-443412.2 is an M8.5+L0 pair, with a physical separation of over 200 AU. This…
Ultracool dwarfs have emerged as key targets for searches of transiting exoplanets. Precise estimates of the host parameters (including mass, age, and radius) are fundamental to constrain the physical properties of orbiting exoplanets. We…
We report on nine wide common proper motion systems containing late-type M, L, or T companions. We confirm six previously reported companions, and identify three new systems. The ages of these systems are determined using diagnostics for…
We selected brown dwarf candidates from the seventh Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS DR7) with new photometric selectioncriteria based on a parameteriaztion of well-known L and T dwarfs. Then we confirmed their status with…
We report the discovery of a very cool d/sdL7+T7.5p common proper motion binary system, SDSS J1416+13AB, found by cross-matching the UKIDSS Large Area Survey Data Release 5 against the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7. The d/sdL7 is…
I have undertaken a comprehensive statistical investigation of the ultracool dwarf companion distribution (spectral type M6 and later). Utilizing a Bayesian algorithm, I tested models of the companion distribution against data from an…
We present the full results of our decade-long astrometric monitoring programs targeting 31 ultracool binaries with component spectral types M7-T5. Joint analysis of resolved imaging from Keck Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope and…
Long-period binary systems containing a B-type hot subdwarf (sdB) and a main-sequence companion are thought to originate from binary interactions involving stable mass transfer from the red giant, the progenitor of the sdB, to the MS…
Disintegrating multiple systems have been previously discovered from kinematic studies of the $\it Hipparcos$ catalogue. They are presumably the result of dynamical encounters taking place in the Galactic disk between single/multiple…
The project Massive Unseen Companions to Hot Faint Underluminous Stars from SDSS (MUCHFUSS) aims at finding hot subdwarf stars with massive compact companions (massive white dwarfs M>1.0 Msun, neutron stars or stellar mass black holes). The…
We report on our large scale search of 2MASS and SuperCOSMOS in the southern hemisphere for very widely separated white dwarf / L-dwarf binary systems and present our findings, including 8 widely separated candidate systems, and proper…
We report the discovery of 14 low-mass binary systems containing mid-M to mid-L dwarf companions with separations larger than 250 AU. We also report the independent discovery of 9 other systems with similar characteristics that were…
We associate 132 low-mass ultracool dwarfs in the southern hemisphere as candidate members of five moving groups using photometric and astrometric selection techniques. Of these objects, we present high resolution spectroscopy for seven…
Extrasolar planet searches targeting very low-mass stars and brown dwarfs are hampered by intrinsic or instrumental limitations. Time series of astrometric measurements with precisions better than one milli-arcsecond can yield new evidence…
Benchmark brown dwarfs are those objects for which fiducial constraints are available, including effective temperature, parallax, age, metallicity. We searched for new cool brown dwarfs in 186 sq.deg. of the new area covered by the data…
Ultracool dwarf stars and brown dwarfs provide a unique probe of large-scale Galactic structure and evolution; however, until recently spectroscopic samples of sufficient size, depth, and fidelity have been unavailable. Here, we present the…
We report the discovery of a wide pair (93 arcsec angular separation) of extremely cool ($T_{eff}<4000$ K) white dwarfs with a very large common proper motion ($\sim1.9$ arcsec/yr). The objects were discovered in a high proper motion survey…
The project Massive Unseen Companions to Hot Faint Underluminous Stars from SDSS (MUCHFUSS) aims at finding hot subdwarf stars with massive compact companions like massive white dwarfs (M>1.0 M$_\odot$), neutron stars, or stellar-mass black…
The aim of the project is to improve our knowledge on the low-mass and low-metallicity population to investigate the influence of metallicity of the stellar (and substellar) mass function. We present the results of a photometric and proper…
Little is known about the existence of extrasolar planets around ultracool dwarfs. Furthermore, binary stars with Sun-like primaries and very low-mass binaries composed of ultracool dwarfs show differences in the distributions of mass ratio…