ODD cosmic objects halfway between a planet and a star may feature their own weather, enhancing their identity as the universe’s mongrels.
Brown dwarfs are not quite massive enough to shine like stars, but nor are they planets because they don’t usually orbit stars. They do seem to have clouds, though.
Etienne Artigau of the Gemini South Observatory in Chile and colleagues observed the brown dwarf SIMP0136 every night for five days and found variations in brightness each time they looked, as if light and dark areas were moving or changing shape.
SIMP0136 is cool enough for solid grains to…
