{"id":17935,"date":"2019-09-24T19:14:35","date_gmt":"2019-09-24T11:14:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/experts-confirm-that-a-second-interstellar-visitor-is-zipping-through-solar-system\/"},"modified":"2019-09-24T19:14:35","modified_gmt":"2019-09-24T11:14:35","slug":"experts-confirm-that-a-second-interstellar-visitor-is-zipping-through-solar-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/experts-confirm-that-a-second-interstellar-visitor-is-zipping-through-solar-system\/","title":{"rendered":"Experts confirm that a second interstellar visitor is zipping through solar system"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_520935\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-520935\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full-width wp-image-520935\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/190913-comet2-630x559.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"630\" height=\"559\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/190913-comet2-630x559.jpg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/190913-comet2-768x682.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/190913-comet2-1260x1119.jpg 1260w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/190913-comet2.jpg 1986w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-520935\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A two-color composite image from the Gemini North Multi-Object Spectrograph in Hawaii shows the interstellar object 2I\/Borisov. Blue and red dashes are images of background stars that appear to streak due to the comet\u2019s motion. (Gemini Observatory \/ NSF \/ AURA Image \/ Travis Rector)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Two years after astronomers made their first detection of a celestial object that came into our solar system from the neighborhood of another star, they have now confirmed the existence of another one.<\/p>\n<p>The comet, originally known as C\/2019 Q4 (Borisov), was discovered on Aug. 30 by Gennady Borisov at the MARGO observatory in Crimea, a region that\u2019s contested by Ukraine and Russia.<\/p>\n<p>Based on an analysis of night-by-night observations, the International Astronomical Union announced today that the comet is \u201cunambiguously interstellar in origin,\u201d coming in from far beyond our solar system. The IAU also gave the object a new name to befit its interstellar status: 2I\/Borisov.<\/p>\n<p>The IAU and NASA say 2I\/Borisov should reach its closest point to the sun on Dec. 7, at a distance of about 180 million miles. That\u2019s tens of millions of miles beyond the orbit of Mars \u2014 well out of harm\u2019s way, as far as Earth is concerned. The IAU says it expects the comet to be at its brightest in the southern sky in December and&nbsp; January. But even then, it will take a moderate-sized telescope to spot it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe comet\u2019s current velocity is high, about 93,000 mph, which is well above the typical velocities of objects orbiting the sun at that distance,\u201d Davide Farnocchia of the Center for Near-Earth Object Studies at NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory said earlier this month in a NASA status report. \u201cThe high velocity indicates not only that the object likely originated from outside our solar system, but also that it will leave and head back to interstellar space.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Farnocchia worked with other astronomers, including experts at the European Space Agency\u2019s Near-Earth Object Coordination Center, to nail down the comet\u2019s precise trajectory. It\u2019s heading for the inner solar system from above \u2014 that is, celestial north \u2014 at a 40-degree angle to the solar system\u2019s ecliptic plane.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"A Second Interstellar Object May Be Flying Toward Earth\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-BvJB_aMg6I?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\" data-ratio=\"0.5625\" data-width=\"800\" data-height=\"450\" style=\"display: block; margin: 0px; width: 800px; height: 450px;\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The observations made to date indicate that 2I\/Borisov has a fuzzy appearance and a short cometary tail. NASA says observations from the University of Hawaii indicate the comet\u2019s nucleus is somewhere between 1.2 and 10 miles wide.<\/p>\n<p>Before 2I\/Borisov, the only interstellar object astronomers knew about was a cosmic interloper known as \u2018Oumuamua \u2014 so they\u2019re not sure what to expect from the second one. But if it\u2019s anything like \u2018Oumuamua, they\u2019re in for a wild ride.<\/p>\n<p>Even though \u2018Oumuamua is now on its way out of the solar system for good, with fading opportunities for observation, the astronomical community is still debating whether it\u2019s an asteroid, a comet or an alien probe.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Oumuamua\u2019s weirdest quality is its extreme length, compared to its width. By some measures, the ratio of length to width is 10 to 1, which would make the object look either like a giant cigar or an appropriately sized starship.<\/p>\n<p>Astronomers at the University of Washington played a role in estimating the size and shape of \u2018Oumuamua, and are looking into C\/2019 Q4 as well.<\/p>\n<p>UW astronomer Lynne Jones discussed the case of 2I\/Borisov in an email forwarded to GeekWire. Jones is involved in the preparations for the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, or LSST. She\u2019s associated with the UW\u2019s DIRAC Institute, which is developing analytical tools for LSST data. Here\u2019s what Jones had to say:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cIt\u2019s pretty amazing to find another object with such an interesting orbit \u2014 another likely interstellar object so soon after the first has really interesting implications for how many of these kinds of things we may find in the future as bigger full-sky surveys (like LSST) start up. It\u2019s also interesting to me that this object is so different from \u2018Oumuamua \u2014 it\u2019s cometary instead of rocky, and has a much higher eccentricity. Luckily it will be visible for much longer than \u2018Oumuamua as well \u2014 we will have about a year to study this object in more detail.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cUW is involved with follow-up observations, partly through obtaining additional observations at Apache Point Observatory [in New Mexico] that will improve the orbit measurement, but primarily are intended to help determine the size of the comet (which can also be used to look for any indications of a light curve, indicating a rotation period which can help constrain its shape). We hope to obtain more observations with APO in the near future to further characterize the comet.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cUW is also involved with the Zwicky Transient Facility&nbsp;(ZTF), and obviously this is very interesting for that survey as well \u2014 it wasn\u2019t observed with ZTF, but there are some follow-up resources associated with the ZTF survey which have been used to observe C\/2019 Q4 as well, to measure a color for the comet.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>In a follow-up tweet, Jones noted that there\u2019s a large team of astronomers on the case. She gave a special shout-out to Bryce Bolin, who\u2019s working at the DIRAC Institute as a senior research fellow with the B612 Foundation\u2019s Asteroid Institute.<\/p>\n<p>Spectral observations from Apache Point and elsewhere could reveal the chemical composition of 2I\/Borisov, telling astronomers whether there are dramatic differences in the makeup of material from other stars. The IAU said the 34-foot Gran Telescopio Canarias in the Canary Islands has already obtained a spectrum of the object \u201cand has found it to resemble those of typical cometary nuclei.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Studying such objects could well provide a new way of investigating processes in planetary systems beyond our own, the IAU said. And who knows? Maybe 2I\/Borisov will turn out to be another flying cigar, this time sporting a trail of cosmic smoke.<\/p>\n<p><em>This is an updated version of a report first published at 10:59 a.m. PT Sept. 13.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A two-color composite image from the Gemini North Multi-Object Spectrograph in Hawaii shows the interstellar object 2I\/Borisov. Blue and red dashes are images of background stars that appear to streak due to the comet\u2019s motion. (Gemini Observatory \/ NSF \/ AURA Image \/ Travis Rector) Two years after astronomers made their first detection of a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3117,4411],"class_list":["post-17935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-oumuamua","tag-interstellar-objects"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17935"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17935\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}