Abstract

Young brown dwarfs act as powerful analogs to the directly-imaged exoplanets, with similar temperatures, masses and ages. Studying these isolated giant planet analogs can give us crucial information for interpreting results from upcoming facilities such as JWST and thirty-meter telescopes such as the E-ELT. In this talk I will present two powerful probes of atmospheric structure — variability monitoring and atmospheric retrievals — that can provide an unprecedented view into giant planet atmospheres. In particular, I will present results from the largest and most sensitive survey for photometric variability in young brown dwarfs to date, as well as an in-depth retrieval investigation into the atmospheres of a pair of planetary-mass twins.