Q&A

What is a brown dwarf quizlet?

What is a brown dwarf quizlet?

Brown dwarf. A star-like object that has insufficient mass to start nuclear reactions in its core and thus become self-luminous.

Which of the following describes a brown dwarf?

Brown dwarfs are objects which have a size between that of a giant planet like Jupiter and that of a small star. In fact, most astronomers would classify any object with between 15 times the mass of Jupiter and 75 times the mass of Jupiter to be a brown dwarf.

What is meant by the term brown dwarf?

Brown dwarf, astronomical object that is intermediate between a planet and a star. Brown dwarfs usually have a mass less than 0.075 that of the Sun, or roughly 75 times that of Jupiter. Both stars and brown dwarfs produce energy by fusion of deuterium (a rare isotope of hydrogen) in their first few million years.

What is a brown dwarf in astronomy?

Brown dwarfs are failed stars about the size of Jupiter, with a much larger mass but not quite large enough to become stars. Like the sun and Jupiter, they are composed mainly of hydrogen gas, perhaps with swirling cloud belts. Unlike the sun, they have no internal energy source and emit almost no visible light.

Is a brown dwarf a failed star?

Astronomers now think Caselden found a brown dwarf — a failed star that lacks the necessary bulk to begin nuclear fusion in its core.

Why does a brown dwarf not count as a star quizlet?

A brown dwarf is a “failed star.” Brown dwarfs do not have enough mass to ever start hydrogen fusion in the core. Their cores are made of degenerate electrons. The maximum mass is about 150 Msun, where the radiation pressure of such star would be so strong that it would blow up.

What if Jupiter was a brown dwarf?

Fusion would be short lived if it became a brown dwarf, an object midway between star and planet. This is the key factor in going from giant planet to star. Exact figures are uncertain, but calculations suggest Jupiter would need to be 80 times as massive as it is to turn into a small red dwarf star.

Why is Jupiter not considered a brown dwarf?

What about substellar brown dwarfs? Our largest planet still doesn’t come close to these “almost stars.” Astronomers define brown dwarfs as bodies with at least 13 times Jupiter’s mass. So, while Jupiter is a planetary giant, its mass falls far short of the mark for considering it a failed star.

What happens to a brown dwarf as it cools off?

They do not have enough mass to produce energy by nuclear fusion. Rather, the small amount of energy emitted by these objects comes almost exclusively from the heat stored in them during the collapse of the parent gas cloud from which they formed. Brown dwarfs therefore gradually cool and fade with cosmological time.

What is the eventual fate of a brown dwarf quizlet?

What is the eventual fate of a brown dwarf? It gradually cools down and becomes ever dimmer.

Why is Jupiter not brown dwarf?

In short, Jupiter does not have enough mass to be classified as dwarf. A Brown dwarf has a minimum mass of approximately 13 times that of Jupiter. That additional mass is required to undergo spontaneous Deuterium burning, which causes the dwarf to heat up considerably.

How hot are brown dwarfs?

The surface temperatures of brown dwarfs depend on both their mass and their age. The most massive and youngest brown dwarfs have temperatures as high as 2,800 K, which overlaps with the temperatures of very low-mass stars, or red dwarfs.

What is a brown dwarf made of?

A brown dwarf is an object which is made of the same things as stars, but does not have enough mass for hydrogen fusion (the combining of hydrogen atoms into helium atoms).

What is a sub brown dwarf?

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 mass below the limiting mass for thermonuclear fusion of deuterium (about 13 M J).