Rogue Brown Dwarf Lurks In Our Cosmic Neighborhood 188
astroengine writes "The UK Infrared Telescope in Hawaii has discovered a lone, cool brown dwarf called UGPSJ0722-05. As far as sub-stellar objects go, this is a strange one. For starters, it's the coolest brown dwarf ever discovered (and astronomers using the UKIRT should know; they are making a habit of finding cool brown dwarfs). Secondly, it's close. In fact, it's the closest brown dwarf to Earth, at a distance of only 10 light years. And thirdly, it has an odd spectroscopic signature, leading astronomers to think that this might be the discovery of a whole new class of brown dwarf."
Cue the Nibiru quacks (Score:5, Insightful)
Just waiting for the Nibiru and Planet X quacks to say "See? We told you so!".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nibiru_collision [wikipedia.org]
Re:thats actually really close... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:thats actually really close... (Score:3, Insightful)
To paraphrase Yogi Berra: In theory, currently achievable theoretical speeds are achievable. In reality, they aren't.
Re:thats actually really close... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Water Vapor and Methane (Score:2, Insightful)
Neither. They're saying it's the only brown dwarf to, well, let me just quote them:
Oddly, when looking at the spectrum from UGPSJ0722-05, there is an anomalous absorption line (i.e. a particular wavelength in the electromagnetic spectrum that is missing) that cannot be explained by our current understanding of brown dwarfs. Perhaps the UKIRT has discovered a new breed of brown dwarf; a very cool object with some chemical in its atmosphere that absorbs infrared radiation at a wavelength of 1.25 micrometers.
Aside from the expected water vapor and methane, they've found this other absorption line pointing to something new and different from previous brown dwarves.
Re:thats actually really close... (Score:3, Insightful)
There is a big difference between the basic technology existing and a practical device using that technology existing. The Apollo project didn't cost $80 billion because the technology was revolutionary. It cost $80 billion because getting something that big to work properly is in itself a massive pain in the ass even if you have all the technology. Hell, just recreating the Apollo project would probably cost close to $80billion without blueprints and we already did it once before. Essentially it's an engineering problem rather than a scientific one.
Re:thats actually really close... (Score:3, Insightful)
If we would really want to we can get rid of the slow down by simply performing a flyby. Who knows how acceptable the former would be of course, considering the limited science and that such mission wouldn't get funding very often...
Re:Probably has water (Score:3, Insightful)
Hm? Wouldn't one expect a star to have a much denser atmosphere due to the high gravity?
Re:thats actually really close... (Score:4, Insightful)