he eyes of every astronomer widened this year when an interstellar traveler was discovered in our solar system.
Despite some suggestions that it could be an alien spacecraft, observations from some of the most powerful telescopes quickly revealed it to be a comet rocketing our way. It might not be aliens making first contact, yet 3I/Atlas, as only the third documented interstellar object to pass through the solar system, still has plenty to teach us, says Jacqueline McCleary, an assistant professor of physics at Northeastern University.
“Interstellar objects, which all seem to be comets, are the only things that we’ve ever gotten physical observations for within our solar system that originated outside our solar system,” McCleary says. “This is sort of like a messenger afar.”
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