WISE 1639−6847

Main article: List of nearest known brown dwarfs
Further information: Y dwarf

Discovery

WISE 1639−6847 was found in space using a telescope named WISE, which stands for the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. Finding objects like this helps scientists learn more about the universe.

Characteristics

WISE 1639−6847 is a special object called a brown dwarf. Brown dwarfs look like stars but are not big enough to shine very brightly. This one is in the constellation Triangulum Australe.

Distance

One exciting fact about WISE 1639−6847 is that it is very close to Earth. It is only about 15.5 light-years away. This makes it the closest brown dwarf in the whole constellation Triangulum Australe. As of February 2024, it is also the second closest known Y dwarf. Y dwarfs are very cool and not easy to see.

Discovery

WISE 1639−6847 was discovered in 2012 using data from the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), a NASA satellite telescope. The discovery was made by C. G. Tinney and team. They used the Magellan Baade telescope in Las Campanas Observatory, located in Chile, to study this object further. Their findings were shared in a paper published in The Astrophysical Journal in November 2012. This discovery showed that WISE 1639−6847 is a special type of object called a Y-type brown dwarf.

Physical properties

WISE 1639−6847 is a special kind of object called a brown dwarf. It is one of the closest stars or brown dwarfs in the constellation Triangulum Australe, about 15.5 light-years from Earth. It was first thought to be between types Y0 and Y0.5. Later studies showed it is unusual, so it was given the type Y0 pec. The word “pec” means peculiar or unusual. Scientists found it hard to match its features with usual models. They needed special conditions to explain it.