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western university / IPAC / Caltech by Robert Hurt An expressive image of the brown dwarf / failed star |
Astronomers have discovered the fastest brown dwarf stars in the known universe, spinning so fast that they risk ripping themselves apart.
A brown dwarf, also known as a "failed star," forms when stars cannot gather enough mass to trigger nuclear reactions, which would convert their core from hydrogen to helium.
"It appears that we encountered a speed limit in the rotation of the brown dwarves," said Megan Tannock, a graduate student in physics and astronomy at Western University who led the discovery.
"Despite the extensive searches conducted by our team and others, no brown dwarfs were found that could rotate faster. In fact, faster rotations might rip apart a brown dwarf itself.
These three celestial bodies, known scientifically as: 2 MASS J04070752 + 1546457, 2 MASS J12195156 + 3128497, and 2 MASSJ03480772−6022270, rotate at an amazing speed of 350 thousand kilometers per hour.
This is ten times faster than normal, when a dwarf usually takes ten hours to rotate on its axis, and 30% faster than the fastest rotations previously recorded.
The record-breaking objects were discovered by astronomers at Western University in Canada using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.
Their findings were then confirmed using the Gemini North telescope at the Magellan Paddy Telescope in Hawaii and the Carnegie Science Foundation in Chile.
In order to measure the rotation of the dwarves, the scientists monitored changes in the emitted light due to the Doppler effect, in which the light was moved up or down in the color spectrum based on speed, and matched that to their movements using a computer model.
"Brown dwarves, like planets with an atmosphere, can have major weather storms that affect their visible brightness," said astronomer at the University of Western Ontario, Stanimir Mitchev. Brown dwarf rotation.
Source: The Independent
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