Related papers: Giant planet and brown dwarf formation
Under the right conditions brown dwarfs that gain enough mass late in their lives to cross the hydrogen burning limit will not turn into low-mass stars, but rather remain essentially brown dwarf-like. While these objects, called either…
Recent studies have shown that close-in brown dwarfs in the mass range 35-55 M$_{\rm Jup}$ are almost depleted as companions to stars, suggesting that objects with masses above and below this gap might have different formation mechanisms.…
Formation of bodies near the deuterium-burning limit is considered by detailed numerical simulations according to the core-nucleated giant planet accretion scenario. The objects, with heavy-element cores in the range 5-30 Mearth, are…
In this short review, we summarize our present understanding (and non-understanding) of exoplanet formation, structure and evolution, in the light of the most recent discoveries. Recent observations of transiting massive brown dwarfs seem…
I discuss the role that disc fragmentation plays in the formation of gas giant and terrestrial planets, and how this relates to the formation of brown dwarfs and low-mass stars, and ultimately to the process of star formation. Protostellar…
The observational properties of brown dwarfs pose challenges to the theory of star formation. Because their mass is much smaller than the typical Jeans mass of interstellar clouds, brown dwarfs are most likely formed through secondary…
Brown dwarfs are intermediate objects between planets and stars. The lower end of the brown-dwarf mass range overlaps with the one of massive planets and therefore the distinction between planets and brown-dwarf companions may require to…
Recent observations point to the presence of structured dust grains in the discs surrounding young brown dwarfs, thus implying that the first stages of planet formation take place also in the sub-stellar regime. Here, we investigate the…
The observational properties of brown dwarfs pose challenges to the theory of star formation. Because their mass is much smaller than the typical Jeans mass of interstellar clouds, brown dwarfs are most likely formed through secondary…
Giant planets and brown dwarfs are thought to form via a combination of pathways, including bottom-up mechanisms in which gas is accreted onto a solid core and top-down mechanisms in which gas collapses directly into a gravitationally-bound…
The formation of objects below or close to the hydrogen burning limit is currently vividly discussed and is one of the main open issues in the field of the origins of stars and planets. Applying various observational techniques, we explored…
We review our present understanding of the physical properties of substellar objects, brown dwarfs and irradiated or non-irradiated gaseous exoplanets. This includes a description of their internal properties, mechanical structure and heat…
Almost by definition brown dwarfs are objects with masses below the hydrogen burning limit, around $0.07\ M_\odot$. Below this mass, objects never reach a steady state where they can fuse hydrogen. Here we demonstrate, in contrast to this…
The occurrence rate of young giant planets from direct imaging surveys is a fundamental tracer of the efficiency with which planets form and migrate at wide orbital distances. These measurements have progressively converged to a value of…
The formation of brown dwarfs (BDs) poses a key challenge to star formation theory. The observed dearth of nearby ($\leq 5$ AU) brown dwarf companions to solar-mass stars, known as the brown dwarf desert, as well as the tendency for…
Planet formation occurs around a wide range of stellar masses and stellar system architectures. An improved understanding of the formation process can be achieved by studying it across the full parameter space, particularly toward the…
In this review, we examine the successes and weaknesses of modern low-mass star and brown dwarf theory.(1) We first focus on the mechanical (equation of state) and thermal (atmosphere) properties and on the evolution. We then examine the…
The physics of brown dwarfs has continuously improved since the discovery of these astrophysical bodies. The first important developments were devoted to the description of their mechanical structure, with the derivation of an appropriate…
Understanding demographic properties of planet populations and multiple star systems constrains theories of planet and star formation. Surveys for very low-mass companions to M-A type stars detect brown dwarfs from multiple star formation…
6500+ exoplanets have been detected using various techniques. This prompted the emergence of many recent works on the taxonomy, or classification, of exoplanets. However, there is still no basic, fundamental definition of 'What is a…