A giant planet candidate near a young brown dwarf. Direct VLT/NACO observations using IR wavefront sensing

We present deep VLT/NACO infrared imaging and spectroscopic observations of the brown dwarf 2MASSWJ 1207334-393254, obtained during our on-going adaptive optics survey of southern young, nearby associations. This ∼25 M_Jup brown dwarf, located ∼70 pc from Earth, has been recently identified as a member of the TW Hydrae Association (age ∼ 8 Myr). Using adaptive optics infrared wavefront sensing to acquire sharp images of its circumstellar environment, we discovered a very faint and very red object at a close separation of ∼780 mas (∼55 AU). Photometry in the H, K_s and L' bands and upper limit in J-band are compatible with a spectral type L5-L9.5. Near-infrared spectroscopy is consistent with this spectral type estimate. Different evolutionary models predict an object within the planetary regime with a mass of M=5±2 M_Jup and an effective temperature of T_eff=1250±200 K.

Based on observations obtained at the Paranal Observatory, Chile, in ESO programs 73.C-0469 and 273.C-5029.