Many discoveries have been made in astronomy lately. For example, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) discovered the oldest black hole in the universe. Now another revolutionary discovery has been made in astronomy. Scientists have identified the first Y-brown dwarf binary system. This marvelous find offers a unique opportunity to study these elusive celestial objects in greater detail.

A Y-type brown dwarf binary system has been discovered for the first time, according to research published March 29 on arXiv.org. Located about 32.7 light-years away in the constellation Eridanus, the object in question has an effective temperature of 460,000. Brown dwarfs are celestial bodies located between planets and stars. They are not large enough to support the nuclear fusion that powers stars like our sun, but they are much larger than planets.

Among brown dwarfs, Y brown dwarfs are the coldest and least bright of these substellar objects. This makes them incredibly difficult to detect and study at temperatures as low as 300 degrees Celsius.

The recently discovered binary system WISE J033605.05 – 014350.4 is located in the constellation Eridanus and consists of two Y-type brown dwarfs orbiting each other. The two brown dwarfs were placed at a distance of 0.084, a position angle of 295 degrees, and magnitude contrasts of 2.8 and 1.8 in F150W and F480M. The binary system was also visualized by the Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam) on the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).

Also, astronomers led by Per Kalissendorf of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor made another exciting discovery. They announced the presence of a companion object to the brown dwarf W0336. This observation was made possible thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) cycle 1 GO program, an examination of 20 Y dwarfs in September 2022.

The discovery of this Y-type brown dwarf binary system is just the beginning. The discovery of this binary system could also provide new insights into planet formation. Brown dwarfs are known to have similar properties to gas giants like Jupiter, and studying their formation could help astronomers better understand how planets form.

The main brown dwarf in the W0336 system is estimated to be 8.5 to 18 times larger than Jupiter. This places it at the upper end of the Y dwarf mass range. The presence of the satellite object also allowed astronomers to estimate the age of the system, which is estimated to be between 1 and 3 billion years.