Brown Dwarf Brewing Up Epic Space Storm

The storm of the century? How about the largest storm since the beginning of time… Scientists have spotted some scary activity on a nearby brown dwarf which may indicate that the small celestial body could be the site of one of the most violent space storms ever witnessed.

The University of Toronto, which is studying Brown Dwarf 2MASS J21392676+0220226 using an infrared camera, witnessed huge variations of brightness on the brown dwarf, which they say may indicated that a huge storm is brewing.

Graduate student Jacqueline Radigan of the University of Toronto said in a statement:

“We found that our target’s brightness changed by a whopping 30 percent in just under eight hours. The best explanation is that brighter and darker patches of its atmosphere are coming into our view as the brown dwarf spins on its axis.”

According to Space.com, scientists believe that the weather patterns on small brown dwarfs is similar to the patterns on much larger planets. The team at the University of Toronto has been observing the brown dwarf for months and found that the brightness variations changed as the weeks went on.

University of Toronto astrophysicist Ray Jayawardhana, said:

“We might be looking at a gigantic storm raging on this brown dwarf, perhaps a grander version of the Great Red Spot on Jupiter in our own solar system, or we may be seeing the hotter, deeper layers of its atmosphere through big holes in the cloud deck.”

Discovery News points out that a brown dwarf isn’t exactly a star and it isn’t exactly a planet. The strange celestial objects are too small to “ignite a long-time fusion” in their cores and they don’t change chemically by depth, so they are often referred to as “failed stars.” The Huffington Post notes that a Brown Dwarf doesn’t have surface features like mountains, ice caps, or rivers, which may have been an explanation for the brightness change.

So if it wasn’t a surface feature, what caused the planet to change brightness so rapidly?

The team will present their paper at the Extreme Solar Systems II conference later this week in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.