Related papers: Brown Dwarfs
Owing to their similarities with giant exoplanets, brown dwarf companions of stars provide insights into the fundamental processes of planet formation and evolution. From their orbits, several brown dwarf companions are found to be more…
The discovery of the first methane brown dwarf provides a framework for describing the important advances in both fundamental physics and astrophysics that are due to the study of companions of stars. I present a few highlights of the…
Astrophysical objects below the stellar mass limit but well above the mass of Jupiter eluded discovery for nearly three decades after Kumar first proposed their existence, and for two decades after Tarter proposed the name "brown dwarfs."…
Brown Dwarfs are the coolest class of stellar objects known to date. Our present perception is that Brown Dwarfs follow the principles of star formation, and that Brown Dwarfs share many characteristics with planets. Being the darkest and…
In this paper, we review the current theory of very low mass stars model atmospheres including the coolest known M~dwarfs, M~subdwarfs, and brown dwarfs, i.e. T$_{eff} \leq 5,000 $K and $-2.0 \le [M/H] \le +0.0$. We discuss ongoing efforts…
We have used multi-epoch images from the Infrared Array Camera on board the Spitzer Space Telescope to search for substellar companions to stars in the solar neighborhood based on common proper motions. Through this work, we have discovered…
The coolest known brown dwarfs are our best analogs to extrasolar gas-giant planets. The prolific detections of such cold substellar objects in the past two years has spurred intensive followup, but the lack of accurate distances is a key…
We report on the results of the spectroscopy of 10 objects previously classified as brown dwarf candidates via RIJHK colors by Eisenbeiss et al. (2009), who performed deep imaging observations on a 0.4 sq.deg. field at the edge of the…
Brown dwarfs are commonly regarded as easily-observed templates for exoplanet studies, with comparable masses, physical sizes and atmospheric properties. There is indeed considerable overlap in the photospheric temperatures of the coldest…
In recent years brown dwarfs have been extended to a new Y-dwarf class with effective temperatures colder than 500K and masses in the range 5-30 Jupiter masses. They fill a crucial gap in observable atmospheric properties between the much…
We briefly outline the physics underlying the mechanical and thermal properties of brown dwarfs, which characterizes their interiors and their atmospheres. We mention the most recent improvements realyzed in the theory of brown dwarfs and…
We report the discovery of the coolest field dwarf yet known, selected as a stellar object with extremely red colors from commissioning imaging data of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Its spectrum from 0.8 to 2.5 microns is dominated by…
We present a method for measuring the physical parameters of the coldest T-type brown dwarfs using low resolution near infrared spectra. By comparing H_2O- and H_2-sensitive spectral ratios between empirical data and theoretical atmosphere…
Methane brown dwarfs, i.e. objects similar to the low mass star Gliese 229B, are characterized by very unusual colours: J-K<~0 and I-J>~5. An analysis of the ESO public images, which cover an area of 37 sq. arcmin in the three filters,…
In order to understand the atmospheres as well as the formation mechanism of giant planets formed outside our solar system, the next decade will require an investment in studies of isolated young brown dwarfs. In this white paper we…
We report the discovery of a very cool, isolated brown dwarf, UGPS 0722-05, with the UKIDSS Galactic Plane Survey. The near-infrared spectrum displays deeper H2O and CH4 troughs than the coolest known T dwarfs and an unidentified absorption…
We have carried out a brown dwarf search over an area of 14' x 23' near the central portion of the Pleiades open cluster in five optical and near infrared bands (i', Z, J, H, Ks) with 10 sigma detection limits of i' = 22.0, J = 20.0 and Ks…
Using two epochs of 4.5um images from the Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) on board the Spitzer Space Telescope, we recently identified a common proper motion companion to the white dwarf WD 0806-661 that is a candidate for the coldest known…
We present preliminary non-grey model atmospheres and interiors for cool brown dwarfs. The resulting synthetic spectra are compared to available spectroscopic and photometric observations of the coolest brown dwarf yet discovered, Gl229B…
Brown dwarfs are compact objects that do not reach temperatures high enough to produce sustained hydrogen fusion. Consequently, they cool over time, gradually evolving through later spectral types. In fact, three new spectral types (L, T,…