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arxiv: astro-ph/0502484 · v1 · submitted 2005-02-23 · 🌌 astro-ph

HST/NICMOS observations of a proto-brown dwarf candidate

D. Apai (1 , 2 , 3) , L. V. Toth (1 , 4 , 5) , Th. Henning (1) , R. Vavrek (6)
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Z. Kovacs (1) D. Lemke (1) (1 - Max Planck Institute for Astronomy Heidelberg Germany; 2 - Steward Observatory Univ. of Arizona Tucson AZ USA; 3 - NASA Astrobiology Institute; 4 - Dept. of Astronomy Lorand Eotvos Univ. Budapest Hungary; 5 - Konkoly Observatory Hungary; 6 - Astrophysics Missions Division ESTEC Norwijk the Netherlands)
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keywords companioncandidateinformationnicmosobservationsyoungarguebackground
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We present deep HST/NICMOS observations peering through the outflow cavity of the protostellar candidate IRAS 04381+2540 in the Taurus Molecular Cloud-1. A young stellar object as central source, a jet and a very faint and close (0.6") companion are identified. The primary and the companion have similar colours, consistent with strong reddening. We argue that the companion is neither a shock-excited knot nor a background star. The colour/magnitude information predicts a substellar upper mass limit for the companion, but the final confirmation will require spectroscopic information. Because of its geometry, young age and its rare low-mass companion, this system is likely to provide a unique insight into the formation of brown dwarfs.

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