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Star formation is happening all around us in the Universe. However, there is still plenty we don\u2019t know about it, including, as a recent press release points out, something that every astronomy textbook points out \u2013 we don\u2019t know the size of the smallest star. Most current answers in those textbooks refer to an object known as a brown dwarf, a cross between a star and a giant planet. Recently, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) found what is believed to be the smallest brown dwarf ever discovered \u2013 and it weighs in at only 3-4 times the weight of Jupiter.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n When searching for brown dwarfs, knowing where to look is important. Kevin Luhman, the lead author of a paper describing the findings and a professor at Penn State University, had a good idea of where. Star cluster IC 348 is found in the constellation Perseus, about 1,000 light years away. It\u2019s only about 5 million years old and has been known as an excellent place to find low-mass brown dwarfs since at least 2009, when another paper described three brown dwarfs with a mass lower than ten times that of Jupiter.<\/p>\n JWST changed the brown dwarf hunting game, though. Its highly sensitive infrared images made it possible to track objects that would be invisible to other telescopes, including larger ground-based ones. In IC 348, many of the brown dwarfs are relatively hot since they had just formed several million years ago. That heat shows up very clearly in JWST\u2019s infrared instrumentation.<\/p>\n \n