fwd: Interesting astrographic features

Laserlight sent me this:

> Oerjan, would you mind to forward this to The List?--Laserlight

done <g>

>The UKIRT survey of the Trapezium Cluster in the Orion Nebula turned
>up more than 100 brown dwarfs - objects that might have become >stars,
but never accumulated sufficient material. With less than 8 >percent of
the sun's mass, such objects don't generate enough internal >heat to
trigger the nuclear reactions involving hydrogen that keep stars
>shining over long periods.
>Nevertheless, scientists say even brown dwarfs produce some nuclear
>energy for a short time (from deuterium, a rare isotope of hydrogen)
if >their mass exceeds 1.3 percent the sun's mass - about 13 times the
>mass of Jupiter. Thus, astronomers have generally defined this as the
>minimum mass for a brown dwarf. 
>The new infrared survey turned up 13 objects below that
13-Jupiter->mass threshold. The mass of the smallest was estimated at
to no more >than about eight Jupiters.
>The researchers dubbed these objects "free-floating planets."
 
Oerjan Ohlson
oerjan.ohlson@telia.com

"Life is like a sewer.
  What you get out of it, depends on what you put into it."
- Hen3ry