Webb Telescope Reveals Mass Limits of Brown Dwarfs in Flame Nebula

Astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope to identify free-floating 'failed stars' as small as two to three times Jupiter's mass in a nearby star-forming region.

The Flame Nebula, located 1,400 light-years away in the Orion constellation, is a young stellar nursery less than a million years old.
Using infrared imaging, Webb identified faint brown dwarfs, objects too small to sustain hydrogen fusion, with masses as low as two to three times that of Jupiter.
These findings suggest a potential lower mass limit for brown dwarfs, as no objects below two Jupiter masses were detected despite Webb's sensitivity to smaller sizes.
Brown dwarfs form through the fragmentation of molecular clouds, a process influenced by gravity, temperature, and pressure, and differ from stars due to their inability to initiate nuclear fusion.
This research builds on decades of Hubble observations and highlights Webb's ability to study faint, low-mass objects obscured by dense gas and dust.