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Radio emission in a nearby ultracool dwarf binary: a multi-frequency study

The substellar triple system VHS J125601.92$-$125723.9 is composed by an equal-mass M7.5 brown dwarf binary and a L7 low-mass substellar object. In this work, we aim to identify the origin of the radio emission occurring in the central binary of VHS 1256$-$1257 while discussing the expected mechanisms involved in the radio emission of ultracool dwarfs (UCDs). We observed this system with the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array, the European very-long-baseline interferometry (VLBI) Network, the enhanced Multi Element Remotely Linked Interferometer Network, the NOrthern Extended Millimeter Array, and the Atacama Large Millimetre Array at frequencies ranging from 5 GHz up to 345 GHz in several epochs during 2017, 2018, and 2019. We have found radio emission at 6 GHz and 33 GHz coincident with the expected position of the central binary of VHS~1256$-$1257. The Stokes I density flux detected were 73 $\pm$ 4 $μ$Jy and 83 $\pm$ 13 $μ$Jy, respectively, with no detectable circular polarisation or pulses. No emission is detected at higher frequencies (230 GHz and 345 GHz) nor at 5 GHz with VLBI arrays. The emission appears to be stable over almost 3 years at 6 GHz. To explain the constraints obtained both from the detections and non-detections we considered multiple scenarios including thermal and non-thermal emission, and different contributions from each component of the binary. Our results can be well explained by non-thermal gyrosynchrotron emission originating at radiation belts with a low plasma density (n$_e$ = 300$-$700 cm$^{-3}$), a moderate magnetic field strength (B $\approx$ 140 G), and an energy distribution of electrons following a power-law ($d N / d E \propto E^{- δ}$) with $δ$ fixed at 1.36. These radiation belts would need to be present in both components and also be viewed equatorially.