Discovery of a Wide Companion near the Deuterium-burning Mass Limit in the Upper Scorpius Association

Béjar, V. J. S.; Zapatero Osorio, M. R.; Pérez-Garrido, A.; Alvarez-Iglesias, C. A.; Martín, E. L.; Rebolo, R.; Villó-Pérez, I.; Díaz-Sánchez, A.
Bibliographical reference

The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 673, Issue 2, pp. L185-L189.

Advertised on:
2
2008
Number of authors
8
IAC number of authors
5
Citations
81
Refereed citations
76
Description
We present the discovery of a companion near the deuterium-burning mass limit located at a very wide distance, at an angular separation of 4.6''+/-0.1'' (projected distance of ~ 670 AU) from UScoCTIO 108, a brown dwarf of the very young Upper Scorpius association. Optical and near-infrared photometry and spectroscopy confirm the cool nature of both objects, with spectral types of M7 and M9.5, respectively, and that they are bona fide members of the association, showing low gravity and features of youth. Their masses, estimated from the comparison of their bolometric luminosities and theoretical models for the age range of the association, are 60+/-20 and 14+2-8 MJup, respectively. The existence of this object around a brown dwarf at this wide orbit suggests that the companion is unlikely to have formed in a disk based on current planet formation models. Because this system is rather weakly bound, they probably did not form through dynamical ejection of stellar embryos.
Related projects
Discovery of a system of super-Earths orbiting the star HD 176986 with about 5.7 and 9.2 Earth masses.
Very Low Mass Stars, Brown Dwarfs and Planets
Our goal is to study the processes that lead to the formation of low mass stars, brown dwarfs and planets and to characterize the physical properties of these objects in various evolutionary stages. Low mass stars and brown dwarfs are likely the most numerous type of objects in our Galaxy but due to their low intrinsic luminosity they are not so
Rafael
Rebolo López