Webb Telescope Might Have Discovered First Brown Dwarfs Outside The Milky Way
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- Oct 25, 2024
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Science
The James Webb Space Telescope has discovered the first brown dwarf star candidates outside the Milky Way. The European Space Agency (ESA) said that these candidates reside in the star cluster NGC 602 that lies on the outskirts of the Small Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way, roughly 2,00,000 light-years from Earth.
🆕 Webb has found candidates for the first young brown dwarfs outside the Milky Way! 🟤🔬 Read more: https://t.co/ol8NQD8Zb7 or 🧵👇 pic.twitter.com/dh5v0HtbPc — ESA Webb Telescope (@ESA_Webb) October 23, 2024
"Only thanks to the incredible sensitivity and resolution in the right wavelength range we are able to detect these objects at such great distances. This has never been possible before and also will remain impossible with telescopes on the ground for the foreseeable future," said lead author Peter Zeidler of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in a statement.
The brown dwarfs, as ESA describes it, are massive cousins of giant gas planets roughly 13 to 75 times more massive than Jupiter. Brown dwarfs are also considered failed stars as they could not sustain nuclear fusion in their cores.
Elena Manjavacas, also a member of the STScI, said that there are nearly 3,000 known brown dwarfs but all of them are in our galaxy. The discovery, which has been published in The Astrophysical Journal, could be the first outside the Milky Way.
Neil Turok
Oct 25, 2024
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