The astronomers found 14 stars that fall into the coldest brown dwarfs, celestial body that is also called a failed star, because it has too little mass to be able to support fusion reactions that can not shine like the Sun billions of years.
Now, with the same equipment, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) NASA, astronomers found the star that is cooler than ever, called WISE 1828 +2650.
I was so cold this star, if you want, we can touch it without fear that burns like fire.
WISE 1828 +2650 was found in the observations which took place in January 2010 - February 2011. More specifically, brown dwarfs are included in the family of dwarf Y. Brown dwarf atmosphere temperature is colder than room temperature of the Earth, which means less than 25 degrees Celsius.
"Brown dwarfs are found through this study is more similar to the temperature of your oven," said Davy Kirkpatrick, one of the scientists working with WISE in the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, USA.
The discovery of brown dwarfs will be of great help astronomers study how stars are formed and the atmosphere on the planet outside the Solar System. Atmospheric brown dwarfs resembles Jupiter but is easier to learn because there are all alone in space, separate from its parent star.
Together with the discovery of the coldest star, the scientists also said that there are 99 other brown dwarfs are found. The discovery of brown dwarfs as a whole was published in the Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. While the discovery of the Y dwarfs published in the Astrophysical Journal recently.
The interesting thing about this discovery is not only the coldest star in the universe, but also of the stars are located relatively close to the Solar System, only about 90-40 light years alone.
Y dwarfs closest to our solar system is within 9 WISE 1541-2250 light years away. The star became the seventh star nearest to our solar system. The nearest star to the Solar System itself is a Prima Centauri, is only 4 light-years away.
Michael Cushing of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, lead author of the paper in the Astrophysical Journal Y dwarfs said, "Finding the Y dwarfs near the Sun we like finding a hidden house on the block where you live."
Cushing added, with WISE, astronomers can find many more dwarf Y. Later, the Y dwarfs may be found that is located much closer than the nearest star to our solar system.
To find the Y dwarfs, astronomers besides using WISE also use the Spitzer Space Telescope, which again selects the Y dwarf candidates were found.
Astronomers are also using the Hubble Space Telescope. Y dwarfs are identified based on spectral characteristics, indicating that the temperature is lower than other brown dwarfs.
Sources:
kompas.com
Related Posts :
