[1][4][5][6][7] In 2009 it was discovered that the Hubble Space Telescope had in fact directly imaged HR 8799 b eleven years earlier, in 1998, suggesting that more exoplanets might be revealed through analysis of HST photographic archives.

[8] Additional precovery images were also obtained by reanalyzing data taken in 2002 at the Subaru Telescope and in 2005 and 2007 at the W. M. Keck Observatory.

[9][10][11] Broadband photometry of HR 8799 b shows that it has thicker clouds in its atmosphere than do older, higher surface gravity substellar objects of the same effective temperature.

[13] Near infrared spectroscopy made with the Palomar Observatory show evidence of ammonia and/or acetylene as well as carbon dioxide, and some methane.

Observations by the James Webb Space Telescope will be capable of confirming or disproving the presence of methane in HR 8799 b's atmosphere.