Observations of a nearby brown dwarf suggest that it has a mottled atmosphere with scattered clouds and mysterious dark spots reminiscent of Jupiter's Great Red Spot, as shown in this artist's concept. The nomadic object, called 2MASS J22081363+2921215, resembles a carved Halloween pumpkin, with light escaping from its hot interior. Brown dwarfs are more massive than planets but too small to sustain nuclear fusion, which powers stars.
Though only roughly 115 light-years away, the brown dwarf is too distant for any features to be photographed. Instead, researchers used the Multi-Object Spectrograph for Infrared Exploration (MOSFIRE) at the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii to study the colors and brightness variations of the brown dwarf's layer-cake cloud structure, as seen in near-infrared light. MOSFIRE also collected the spectral fingerprints of various chemical elements contained in the clouds and how they change with time.
Credits
Artwork
NASA, ESA, STScI, Leah Hustak (STScI)
