Tech
Evidence of real ninth planet found
Years after talk that there might be a mysterious planet which might be lurking on the edge of our solar system, scientist at the California Institute of Technology have officially discovered evidence of a giant planet tracing a bizarre, highly elongated orbit in the outer solar system.
Nicknamed planet Nine, the planet according to scientists has a mass about 10 times that of Earth and orbits about 20 times farther from the sun on average than does Neptune (which orbits the sun at an average distance of 2.8 billion miles).
Read also: Scientists may have found new planet lurking on the edge of the solar system
The researchers, Konstantin Batygin and Mike Brown, who stumbled upon the new planet says it takes between 10,000 and 20,000 years to make just one full orbit around the sun while also revealing that the new planet’s existence was discovered through mathematical modelling and computer simulations but have not yet observed the object directly.
“This would be a real ninth planet,” says Brown, the Richard and Barbara Rosenberg Professor of Planetary Astronomy.
“There have only been two true planets discovered since ancient times, and this would be a third. It’s a pretty substantial chunk of our solar system that’s still out there to be found, which is pretty exciting.”
Before now, scientists have long suspected that our solar system might harbour a hidden planet and after decades of research, they have been proven right.
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