Euclid: Early Release Observations – A glance at free-floating newborn planets in the σ Orionis cluster

Martín, E. L.; Žerjal, M.; Bouy, H.; Martin-Gonzalez, D.; Muñoz Torres, S.; Barrado, D.; Olivares, J.; Pérez-Garrido, A.; Mas-Buitrago, P.; Cruz, P.; Solano, E.; Zapatero Osorio, M. R.; Lodieu, N.; Béjar, V. J. S.; Zhang, J. -Y.; del Burgo, C.; Huélamo, N.; Laureijs, R.; Mora, A.; Saifollahi, T.; Cuillandre, J. -C.; Schirmer, M.; Tata, R.; Points, S.; Phan-Bao, N.; Goldman, B.; Casewell, S. L.; Reylé, C.; Smart, R. L.; Dominguez-Tagle, C.; Escobar, A.; Sedighi, N.; Tsilia, S.; Vitas, N.; Ayadi, A.; Aghanim, N.; Altieri, B.; Andreon, S.; Auricchio, N.; Baldi, M.; Balestra, A.; Bardelli, S.; Basset, A.; Bender, R.; Bonino, D.; Branchini, E.; Brescia, M.; Brinchmann, J.; Camera, S.; Capobianco, V.; Carbone, C.; Carretero, J.; Casas, S.; Castellano, M.; Cavuoti, S.; Cimatti, A.; Congedo, G.; Conselice, C. J.; Conversi, L.; Copin, Y.; Corcione, L.; Courbin, F.; Courtois, H. M.; Cropper, M.; Da Silva, A.; Degaudenzi, H.; Di Giorgio, A. M.; Dinis, J.; Dubath, F.; Dupac, X.; Dusini, S.; Ealet, A.; Farina, M.; Farrens, S.; Ferriol, S.; Fosalba, P.; Frailis, M.; Franceschi, E.; Fumana, M.; Galeotta, S.; Garilli, B.; Gillard, W.; Gillis, B.; Giocoli, C.; Gómez-Alvarez, P.; Grazian, A.; Grupp, F.; Guzzo, L.; Haugan, S. V. H.; Hoar, J.; Hoekstra, H.; Holmes, W.; Hook, I.; Hormuth, F.; Hornstrup, A.; Hu, D.; Hudelot, P.; Jahnke, K.; Jhabvala, M.; Keihänen, E. et al.
Referencia bibliográfica

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Fecha de publicación:
5
2025
Número de autores
184
Número de autores del IAC
13
Número de citas
0
Número de citas referidas
0
Descripción
We provide an early assessment of the imaging capabilities of the Euclid space mission to deeply probe nearby star-forming regions and associated very young open clusters, and in particular, to determine to which extent it can shed light into the newborn free- floating planet population. This paper focusses on a low-reddening region observed in just one Euclid pointing. The dust and gas has been cleared out from the region by the hot σ Orionis star. One late-M and six known spectroscopically confirmed L-type ultracool members in the σ Orionis cluster were used as benchmarks to provide a high-purity procedure to select new candidate members with Euclid. The exquisite angular resolution and depth delivered by the Euclid instruments allowed us to focus on bona fide point sources. A cleaned sample of σ Orionis cluster substellar members was produced, and the initial mass function (IMF) was estimated by combining Euclid and Gaia data. Our σ Orionis substellar IMF is consistent with a power-law distribution without a significant steepening at the planetary-mass end. No evidence of a low-mass cutoff is found down to the detection limit of this study at 4 Jupiter masses in the very young σ Orionis open cluster. ★This paper is published on behalf of the Euclid Consortium.