Tuesday, 22 October 2024

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Three decades later, first brown dwarf ever found offers a surprise

 Published: 12:33, 20 October 2024

Three decades later, first brown dwarf ever found offers a surprise

In 1995, astronomers confirmed the discovery for the first time of a brown dwarf, a body too small to be a star and too big to be a planet - sort of a celestial tweener. But it turns out that was not the full story.

Researchers now have taken a fresh look at that brown dwarf and learned that it actually is not a single brown dwarf but rather two of them orbiting astonishingly close to each other while circling a small star. This was documented in two new studies using telescopes in Chile and Hawaii.

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