The object is estimated to have a diameter of 130 to 370 kilometers
REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA — Astronomers have discovered that a large object moving from the outer reaches of the solar system will approach Saturn’s orbit in the next decade. The object is a giant comet.
The comet, known as UN271, was first discovered by the Dark Energy Survey (DES). It is an international collaborative project started in 2013 that aims to map galaxies, detect supernovae and unravel the mysteries of dark energy.
Reported from Fox, according to scientists, the chunk of rock and ice is estimated to be about 130 to 370 kilometers in diameter. Some scientists classify UN271 2014 as a small dwarf planet, although Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics astronomer Jonathan McDowell questioned the analysis.
“Looks like it might be too small to qualify as a dwarf planet?” he wrote in Twitter. “But very cool.”
This image of a Trans-Neptune Object (TNO) posted by University of Pennsylvania astronomer Pedro Bernardinelli shows a large white blob. This image consists of several DES images taken over the period of the year between 2014 and 2018.
The orbit of this giant comet has been updated several times, but it is very long, reaching hundreds of billions of kilometers from the sun and taking about 600,000 years.
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