Interstellar Visitor `Oumuamua
In October last year we have for the first time ever detected a visitor from another star! The discovery of this interstellar piece of space-debris is a tribute to mankind's inquisitive nature.
Artist's impression of the interstellar asteroid `Oumuamua
Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser - source: Wikipedia
On October 19th 2017 the foreign object was first discovered using the Pan-STARRS telescope on Hawaii. This telescope continually scans the sky for moving or otherwise animate objects: Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System, is the telescope's full name and the "rapid response system" part gives this niche of scientific investigation a sense of urgency and action, like it's the scouting team at the forefront of astronomical discoveries... I like it :-)
As a good scout should, the discovery was immediately reported to ESO's Very Large Telescope in Chile and other observatories around the world for subsequent observations. It was originally designated object "1I / 2017 U1", with the "I" standing for "Interstellar", because it's speed and trajectory soon made clear that the object didn't originate in our own solar system, but had to have come from another solar system. It soon was given a friendlier name, `Oumuamua, which is Hawaiian for "scout". Thus making this a case of a scout discovering another scout ;-)
The closest `Oumuamua came to us was a distance of 15 million miles, which means we've only ever seen it as a speck on a screen:
`Oumuamua made its closest approach to Earth - about 15 million miles (24 million kilometers) - on Oct. 14. The object is now barreling toward the outer solar system and has been too distant and faint to study even with large telescopes since mid-December, NASA officials have said. But astronomers gathered a slew of data about 'Oumuamua while they could, and they will doubtless be mining this information for a long time to come.
source: Space.com - March 19, 2018
Hyperbolic trajectory of `Oumuamua through the inner Solar System with the Sun at the focus
source: Wikipedia
This means that all we know about it's appearance is based on our best scientific guesses. For example, the fact that the speck irregularly changed in brightness indicated that the asteroid tumbles on more than one axis. This and other observations, combined with decades worth of experience in observing objects from our own solar system, leads us to believe that it's very elongated, less than half a mile in length and about 10 times longer than it's wide. The artist's impression at the start of this post is really as close as we can come to determining how it actually looks. Most probably.
And we won't get any new data, because by now `Oumuamua is on it's way to leave our solar system and continue it's travels in the general direction of the Pegasus constellation. Since our scout is traveling at a speed of approximately one light-year per 11,000 years it'll take millions of years before another solar system gets the surprise visit we had last year. Who knows what civilization will be telling it's story the, if any?
The story of 'Oumuamua, the first visitor from another star system | Karen J. Meech
I'll leave you with the video above, which is the full TED talk about `Oumuamua. The year 2017 ended on a very extraterrestrial note, because just when we lost sight of our interstellar visitor, the U.S. Government for the first time ever released official footage of UFO's: The REAL X-Files. Personally I hope that this year will end in an equally interesting manner. But I'll be back here as soon as tomorrow, so until then; keep cool and keep steeming!
Recent articles you might be interested in:
| Latest article >>>>>>>>>>> | Scary Real |
|---|---|
| An Open Invitation To Alex Jones | Big Trouble With Big Data |
| The Mystery Of Life | Sluggish Beauty |
| The REAL X-Files | Water's Fourth Phase |
Thanks for stopping by and reading. If you really liked this content, if you disagree (or if you do agree), please leave a comment. Of course, upvotes, follows, resteems are all greatly appreciated, but nothing brings me and you more growth than sharing our ideas. It's what Steemit is made for!
Just for Full Disclosure, I'm invested in these crypto-currencies:
Bitcoin | Litecoin | EOS | OmiseGo | FunFair | KIN | Pillar | DENT | Polymath | XDCE | 0x | Decred | Ethereum | Carmel | XYO
wow that's a pretty sizable visitor! Hopefully a one time passerby.
Billions of civilization exist out there, some are more advanced than us and other less.