Follow
In a very unexpected move, it seems that scientists might have finally found real evidence that the mysterious planet nine actually exists in the solar system. The discovery of a Trans Neptunian object with an orbit potentially altered by a ninth planet has baffled experts. In fact, evidence regarding the existence of this planet has been mounting for years now, but it was never something clear. Now, a new study, which the arXiv physics reprint server recently published, claims that planet nine might be to blame for the unusual orbit of a Trans Neptunian space object.
The team called this object 2015 BP519, and its orbit around the sun is 35 to 862 times the radius of our planet’s orbit around the sun. The anomaly is that unlike all the other planets orbiting the sun, the unusual object orbits at a 54° angle. Actually, this is the most extreme Trans-Neptunian Object ever found. So, in order to reach their unexpected conclusion, the team used some computer simulation of the solar system. This is how they found that the object had a very unusual orbit.
The ninth planet might be real after all
After that, the team added certain properties of a possible ninth planet which some researchers from Caltech theorized about in 2015. Guess what? The object’s orbit matched almost exactly. According to David Gerdes, this is not clear evidence that there is indeed a planet nine. However, the mere presence of this object and it strange orbit might make this a very clear possibility.
For years, astronomers have talked about the discovery of a planet nine in our solar system. Most theorized that it could be a super-sized Earth-like planet. Astrophysicist Konstantin Batygin says that now, there are five line of observational evidence that point towards a ninth planet existing. Now, this new Trans-Neptunian object only adds to this mounting evidence.
Image source: flickr
