The Brown Dwarf Debate
Thanks to NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) project and the Space Telescope Science Institute for supporting this video. This video is about the line between Brown dwarfs and gas giant...
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The International Astronomical Union defines Brown Dwarfs as balls of gas in space that are too small to be bona-fide hydrogen-burning stars, but large enough to burn deuterium, which anything bigger than about 13 times the mass of Jupiter can do. Because of this, brown dwarfs are often called “failed stars” or “super Jupiters.” However, there’s a major problem with this deuterium-burning-based definition: it doesn’t make any scientific sense. First, unlike how hydrogen fusion is huge since it means you can shine brightly for millions or billions of years, burning deuterium doesn’t appear to affect an astronomical object in any particularly meaningful way, which is probably why you haven’t heard much about it. I mean, on this density vs ma...
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The International Astronomical Union defines Brown Dwarfs as balls of gas in space that are too small to be bona-fide hydrogen-burning stars, but large enough to burn deuterium, which anything bigger than about 13 times the mass of Jupiter can do. Because of this, brown dwarfs are often called “failed stars” or “super Jupiters.” However, there’s a major problem with this deuterium-burning-based definition: it doesn’t make any scientific sense. First, unlike how hydrogen fusion is huge since it means you can shine brightly for millions or billions of years, burning deuterium doesn’t appear to affect an astronomical object in any particularly meaningful way, which is probably why you haven’t heard much about it. I mean, on this density vs ma...
