An international research team led by MIT astronomers has identified a previously unknown type of stellar system in which a low-mass star slowly draws material from a brown dwarf companion. The system, designated ZTF J0440+2325 and located approximately 300 light-years from Earth within the Milky Way galaxy, represents the first confirmed observation of such a gradual mass transfer between two low-mass objects. The feeding process occurs so slowly that material exchange could continue for hundreds of thousands of years or potentially several billion years.
The discovery emerged from analysis of data collected by the Zwicky Transient Facility, an astronomical survey equipped with a telescope at Palomar Observatory in California that monitors changes in celestial object brightness. MIT assistant professor Kevin Burdge initially noticed an unusual triangular light curve pattern that did not match the characteristics of other known stellar phenomena, such as black widow binary systems containing neutron stars. The researchers eventually determined that both objects in the system had relatively small masses compared to typical stars, which explained the subtle orbital motion rather than the dramatic whipping motion associated with more massive stellar pairs.
Further observations using multiple telescopes revealed the system contains a central star with approximately 85 Jupiter masses orbited by a brown dwarf with roughly 25 Jupiter masses. The brown dwarf completes one full orbit around its host star every 87 minutes, maintaining an extremely close separation between the two objects. The research team, which included collaborators from institutions including Caltech, the University of Hawaii, and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, published their findings in Nature Astronomy on October 5.
The discovery presents a significant contrast to previously understood stellar interactions. Most planetary systems maintain stable orbits around their stars, while astronomers have observed relatively few instances of stars rapidly consuming planetary or brown dwarf companions. This newly identified system demonstrates an intermediate scenario in which gradual material transfer between low-mass objects could persist over cosmic timescales, fundamentally expanding scientific understanding of how stellar systems evolve and interact over billions of years.
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