Sub-brown dwarf

Comparison: the Sun (yellow), a young sub-brown dwarf (red), and Jupiter (multi-colored). As the sub-brown dwarf ages, it will gradually cool and shrink.

A sub-brown dwarf or planetary-mass brown dwarf is an astronomical object that formed in the same manner as stars and brown dwarfs (i.e. through the collapse of a gas cloud) but that has a planetary mass, therefore by definition below the limiting mass for thermonuclear fusion of deuterium (about 13 MJ).[1] Some researchers call them rogue planets[2] whereas others call them planetary-mass brown dwarfs.[3]

  1. ^ Working Group on Extrasolar Planets – Definition of a "Planet" Archived 16 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine POSITION STATEMENT ON THE DEFINITION OF A "PLANET" (IAU)
  2. ^ Delorme, P.; et al. (December 2012). "CFBDSIR2149-0403: a 4–7 Jupiter-mass rogue planet in the young moving group AB Doradus ?". Astronomy & Astrophysics. 548: A26. arXiv:1210.0305. Bibcode:2012A&A...548A..26D. doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201219984. S2CID 50935950.
  3. ^ Luhman, K. L. (21 April 2014). "Discovery of a ~250 K Brown Dwarf at 2 pc from the Sun". The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 786 (2): L18. arXiv:1404.6501. Bibcode:2014ApJ...786L..18L. doi:10.1088/2041-8205/786/2/L18. S2CID 119102654.