"Close Orbiting Stars and the Survival of Gas Giants on Wide Orbits"

Astronomers have discovered a record-breaking binary system, ZTF J2020+5033, consisting of a high-mass brown dwarf and a low-mass red dwarf that orbit each other on a 1.9-hour rotation, making it the closest orbit a brown dwarf has been found in yet. The distance between the two objects is less than half the radius of the Sun. This discovery could provide insights into the formation and evolution of brown dwarfs. The system's red dwarf is relatively small, while the brown dwarf is near the upper mass limit for these objects. The researchers believe that magnetic braking, a process that slows the star's spin and shrinks the orbit, is playing a role in the system's decay. This finding suggests that close low-mass binaries like ZTF J2020+5033 may be more common than previously thought.