A series of articles published in the “Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series” reports the detection of organic molecules potentially important for the birth of life forms in some protoplanetary disks. A team of researchers used the ALMA radio telescope as part of the MAPS program. ALMA made it possible to detect the emissions of molecules such as cyanoacetylene, acetonitrile, and cyclopropenylidene in the disks of young stars IM Lupi, GM Aurigae, AS 209, HD 163296, and MWC 480. These organic compounds are precursors of more complex molecules important in biological processes and some of them are similar to those that formed in the solar system.

An article published in “The Astrophysical Journal” reports a study that reveals in detail never before seen the physical and chemical effects of the impact of a protostellar jet in the Orion Nebula. A team of researchers led by José Eduardo Méndez Delgado, a doctoral student at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), used observations conducted with the VLT and twenty years of images from the Hubble Space Telescope. This made it possible to examine the impact of the protostellar jet emitted by the object cataloged as HH204 on the surrounding environment and the consequent changes in the density and temperature of the gas in the Orion Nebula. This in turn caused an increase in the gas level of atoms of heavy elements such as iron and nickel.

An article published in “The Astrophysical Journal Letters” reports a study on the brown dwarf classified as WISEA J153429.75-104303.3, or simply WISE 1534–1043, nicknamed the Accident because it was discovered purely by chance. A team of researchers used observations conducted with various telescopes to try to understand the characteristics of a brown dwarf different from the ones already known. Its emissions are very dim making it difficult to obtain the desired information but the researchers’ conclusion is that it’s very old, with an age between 10 and 13 billion years, and passed close to much more massive objects that accelerated it until reaching the remarkable speed detected. Its relative proximity to Earth could be random or indicate that brown dwarfs of that type are more common than expected but we can’t detect them with current instruments.

An article published in the journal “Astronomy & Astrophysics” reports a study on 5 objects on the boundary between brown dwarf and star discovered thanks to NASA’s TESS space telescope. A team of researchers coordinated by a group of Swiss entities conducted follow-up observations of the 5 objects to better understand the nature of brown dwarfs, what distinguishes them from stars, and what is the boundary between these two classes of objects.