Program: GN-2016B-FT-14

The measurement of the minimum mass of the IMF would provide a fundamental test of theories of star formation. To provide better constraints on the shape of the substellar IMF and its minimum mass, we are performing a search for low-mass brown dwarfs in the Taurus star-forming region (140 pc) using optical/IR color-magnitude diagrams and proper motions measured from multi-epoch Spitzer images. Through this analysis, we have identified 9 promising candidates that should have spectral types later than M9 (<15 Jupiter masses) if they are members of Taurus. Most of these candidates are fainter than the least massive known members of Taurus. Spectroscopy is required to verify the youth and cool nature of these candidates. We observed 5 of these targets with GNIRS through a Fast Turnaround proposal in late 2015, all of which were confirmed as substellar members of Taurus. We now propose to obtain GNIRS spectra of the 4 remaining candidates.