The Mouse That Roared - Chandra Captures Flare From Brown Dwarf
chandra_198 July 11th, 2000
Credit: NASA/UCB/Caltech/R.Rutledge et al.
Chandra has detected the first flare from a brown dwarf, or failed star. For most of the observation there were no X-rays from the brown dwarf (left panel), then the brown dwarf turned on with a bright X-ray flare (right panel). The energy emitted in the flare was comparable to a small solar flare and is thought to be produced by a twisted magnetic field. LP 944-20 is one of the best studied brown dwarfs because it is only 16 light years from Earth. It is about 500 million years old and has a mass that is about 60 times that of Jupiter, or 6 percent of the Sun's mass. The brown dwarf's diameter is about one-tenth that of the Sun and it has a rotation period of less than five hours.
Provider: Chandra X-ray Observatory
Image Source: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2000/1054/
Curator: Chandra X-ray Observatory, Cambridge, MA, USA
Image Use Policy: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/image_use.html
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Image Details
Distance
Position Details
Color Mapping
- ID
- 198
- Subject Category
- B.3.2.3
- Subject Name
- Brown Dwarf LP 944-20
- Credits
- NASA/UCB/Caltech/R.Rutledge et al.
- Release Date
- 2000-07-11
- Lightyears
- 16
- Redshift
- 16
- Reference Url
- http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2000/1054/
- Type
- Observation
- Image Quality
- Good
- Distance Notes
- Facility
- Chandra
- Instrument
- ACIS
- Color Assignment
- Pseudocolor
- Band
- X-ray
- Bandpass
- X-ray
- Central Wavelength
- 0.8267
- Start Time
- 1999-12-15
- Integration Time
- Dataset ID
- 624
- Notes
- D
- Coordinate Frame
- ICRS
- Equinox
- J2000
- Reference Value
- 54.89458333, -35.43055556
- Reference Dimension
- Reference Pixel
- Scale
- Rotation
- Coordinate System Projection:
- TAN
- Quality
- Position
- FITS Header
- Notes
- Creator (Curator)
- Chandra X-ray Observatory
- URL
- http://chandra.harvard.edu
- Name
- Chandra X-ray Observatory Center
- cxcpub@cfa.harvard.edu
- Telephone
- 617.496.7941
- Address
- 60 Garden St.
- City
- Cambridge
- State/Province
- MA
- Postal Code
- 02138
- Country
- USA
- Rights
- http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/image_use.html
- Publisher
- Chandra X-ray Center
- Publisher ID
- chandra
- Resource ID
- browndwarf_scale.tif
- Resource URL
- http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2000/1054/browndwarf_scale.tif
- Related Resources
- Metadata Date
- 2012-07-27
- Metadata Version
- 1.2
Detailed color mapping information coming soon...
