WISE: Wide-Field Infrared Survey ExplorerWISE HomeWISE: Wide-Field Infrared Survey ExplorerWISE: Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer
Mission Science News & Events Education & Outreach Multimedia Gallery For Astronomers
WISE: Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer
spacer
    WISE Home
divider
WISE Multimedia Gallery Images
divider
Movies & Simulations
divider
Slideshows
divider
Podcasts
divider
WWT Guided Tour
     
WISE Multimedia Gallery

Download Options:

small (51K) 310 x 148 JPEG
medium (111K) 620 x 295 JPEG
large (264K) 1240 x 590 JPEG
original (1.46M) 1240 x 590 TIFF

 

WISE Multimedia Gallery

Packaged Image:

The green dot located in the center of the star field is the first brown dwarf captured by WISE.

Download Options:

Packaged image (849K) 3000 x 2400 JPG

Packaged image (18.2M)
10 x 8 in. PDF

 

 

WISE

Multimedia Gallery

First Ultra-Cool WISE Brown Dwarf

The green dot located in the center of the star field is the first brown dwarf captured by WISE.

Nov 9, 2010 - Collecting Brown Dwarfs in the Night Sky

That green dot in the middle of this image might look like an emerald amidst glittering diamonds, but it is actually a dim star belonging to a class termed brown dwarfs. This particular object, named "WISEPC J045853.90+643451.9" after its location in the sky, is the first ultra-cool brown dwarf discovered by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. WISE is scanning the skies in infrared light, picking up the signatures of all sort of cosmic gems, including brown dwarfs.

The mission's infrared vision makes it particularly good at picking brown dwarfs out of a starry sky. This view shows three of WISE’s four infrared channels, color-coded blue, green and red, with blue showing the shortest wavelengths of infrared light and red, the longest. The methane in the atmospheres of brown dwarfs absorbs this color-coded blue light, and the objects themselves are too faint to give off a lot of the red light. That leaves green. As can be seen in this picture, the little green dot of a brown dwarf stands out against the sparkly, hotter blue stars.

The brown dwarf is located 18 to 30 light-years away in the northern constellation of Camelopardalis, or the giraffe; in fact, the brown dwarf is positioned right on the neck of the giraffe, adorning it like an emerald necklace. This is one of the coolest brown dwarfs known, with a temperature of roughly 600 Kelvin, or 620 degrees Fahrenheit.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE Team

 
       
   
-About the Object-
Name: WISEPC J045853.90+643451.9
Type: Star > Brown Dwarf

Distance:  between 18 and 30 light-years

Temperature: 600 K

-About the Image-
Position of object (J2000): RA=04h 58m 54s; Dec=+64° 34’ 53”
Constellation: Camelopardalis
Field of View: 0.474 x 0.225 degrees
Orientation: North is 172 degrees left of vertical
Color Mapping: Blue=3.4 microns; Green=4.6 microns; Red=12 microns
 
       
    Return to Image Index  
WISE
logos
spacer
UCLA JPL
Last updated 3/7/12 © UC Regents

NASA Untitled Document