Context: Interstellar Comet 2I/Borisov Swings Past Sun
- First identified comet to arrive here from another star.
- The Sun’s gravity is slightly deflecting its trajectory, but can’t capture it because of the shape of its orbit and high velocity of about 100,000 miles per hour.
- NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has provided the sharpest views
- Hubble revealed that the heart of the comet, a loose agglomeration of ices and dust particles, is likely no more than about 3,200 feet across, about the length of nine football fields
Benefits
- Investigating interstellar objects can provide unique data about other star system and their formation.
Other
- The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between ESA (the European Space Agency) and NASA. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope
- Borisov is only the second interstellar object that we know of. The first was the pencil-shaped body named ‘Oumuamua’ which was spotted shooting through the solar system in September 2017
