Six facts about the most unusual interstellar guest – Oumoumoua

October 19, 2017, during routine observation with the Pan-STARRS telescope, the interstellar object Oumoumoua. The impression of this event was the same as that of an unexpected dinner in a distant country. After talking to the guest, you will understand what are the habits and culture of this country without visiting it. This is an excellent opportunity, especially since we need hundreds of years, if not thousands of years, to visit the nearest star using current chemical missiles.

It's amazing that our first interstellar guest was too weird and unlike anything we've seen so far. But until we discover how unusual this space object is, it dissolves in the darkness of space and we can not verify its strange properties anymore.

Here is the list of six unusual facts about Oumoumoua:

1. Assuming that other planetary systems are reminiscent of the solar system, Pan-STARRS should not discover such a cosmic scale. The article, published ten years ago, predicts a large number of interstellar asteroids, thousands of times smaller than Ummoumoua and which are now expected to be part of the accidental cost of asteroids. In other words, discovering umumoua means that the number of interstellar objects is much larger than it was supposed to be. Each star of the Milky Way, during its existence, should shed 10¹⁵ similar objects in order to obtain a sufficient population of asteroids and thus explain the discovery of umumoua.
2. Umumuna flew from a very specific point of space – the local kinematic rest reference point (LSR). It is a point in the vicinity of the Sun where the speed of the celestial body is equal to the average speed of the stars of this region. That is to say that all the surrounding stars are also moving. To put it simply, to arrive from this point is the perfect cover or camouflage, which gives no chance of understanding where Oumoumoua has arrived.
3. Scientists believe that most asteroids are detached from their parent star when they are on the periphery of their planetary system. For example, in the Oort cloud of our solar system, which extends 100,000 times farther than Earth to the Sun, the gravity of the Sun has little influence over them. For these objects, even very small speeds – in the order of a kilometer per second – are enough to fly in space. But while leaving, these asteroids keep the speed of their star on LSR. In other words, if Oumoumuna had flown from a typical star, its speed had to be high – about 20 km / s (LSR average speed). But this thesis does not apply to the cosmic guest
4. We do not have a photo of Umumuna, but its brightness, due to sunlight, changes 10 times every 8 hours, as does the period of rotation around its own axis. This means that the asteroid has a long elongated shape – its length is at least 5-10 times larger than the width. However, the badysis of his "acrobatic" movement showed that his form was a pancake. All asteroids, even the most extreme, observed in the history of humanity, have a length / width ratio of less than three times.
5. The Spitzer Space Telescope did not find any heat in the form of Uumuna infrared radiation. Given the temperature of its surface and the trajectory of this asteroid near the Sun, we can say that its maximum size is about 100 meters. Assuming this limit is true, Umumuna must be exceptionally bright, with a reflection factor at least 10 times greater than the asteroid of the solar system.
6. The trajectory of Oumoumoua is removed from the forecast, calculated on the basis of the gravity of the Sun. The deviation is low – about two hundred percent, but statistically significant. Such behavior is manifested in comets when ice on their surface begins to heat under the effect of sun heat and creates, with evaporation, a rocket thrust. But such a steam would form a queue, and nothing of the sort was noticed. The Spitzer telescope showed the total absence of carbon molecules or dust around Umumoua. It became clear that there was no gas vapor left. In addition, the queue would change the rotation period of Umumoua, but there were no such changes.

This change of the orbit of Ummoumuna could not be accomplished by breaking a small portion of the asteroid, as it would act at a simple impulse, unlike to the observed continuous impact. In this case, there is only one possibility: the extra thrust comes from the radiation of the Sun. For this push to be effective, the Oumamura must be thinner than one millimeter, but not less than 20 meters. That is to say a solar canvas similar to that of the Japanese mission IKAROS.

Assuming that this space object is artificial, there is no way to decide that it is a space letter "in a bottle", which alone has arrived after so many years of searching for signals of extraterrestrial civilizations. This solar cloth has survived the incessant clashes with interstellar atoms and dust as they move through galaxies.

When we consider the possibility that Oumoumuna is of artificial origin, it is good to remember what Sherlock Holmes says – when all possible options are excluded, what remains, unbelievable, is the truth . The Kepler Space Telescope has shown that many stars in the Milky Way have Earth-like planets, with the potential to have liquid water on the surface and live as we know it. That's why it's fair to badume that there are many objects artificially created in interstellar space – perhaps used for intelligence purposes, maybe just excerpts d & # 39; equipment. But to check the artificial origin of Ummoumuna, more data is needed. Or, as Carl Sagan says,extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence".

In fact, the probability that an artificial cosmic body falls in the solar system is too small. For a similar object to come to us by chance, it must be released into the cosmos through the life of the distant star.¹⁵ solar paths – one every 5 minutes. But this number of solar paths can be significantly reduced if objects such as Oumoumuna do not accidentally fly, but follow special orbits that allow them to reach the areas of residence of planetary star systems such as our solar system.

Oumoumuna is moving too fast for our chemical fuel missiles to catch up on the planets without gravitational help. But this strange asteroid will take thousands of years to leave the solar system and we will be able to study it with a space probe if, of course, we develop technologies to accelerate the movements in space in the next 10 to 20 years.

In addition, we can expect a new guest star. In the coming years, the large LSST telescope (large synoptic telescope), which is very sensitive and can detect objects similar to Oumoumoua, should work. Many similar objects should be found during the first year of his work. But if he does not find other people, we will know that Umumoua was really special and we must catch up with him and understand what he is hiding.

6 strange facts about the interstellar visitor & # 39; Oumuamua