  We report the discovery of a population of late-M and L field dwarfs with
unusual optical and near-infrared spectral features that we attribute to low
gravity -- likely uncommonly young, low-mass brown dwarfs. Many of these
new-found young objects have southerly declinations and distance estimates
within 60 parsecs. Intriguingly, these are the same properties of recently
discovered, nearby, intermediate-age (5-50 Myr), loose associations such as
Tucana/Horologium, the TW Hydrae association, and the Beta Pictoris moving
group. We describe our efforts to confirm cluster membership and to further
investigate this possible new young population of brown dwarfs.

Astrophysics