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The interstellar object Oumuamua went through our solar system last fall. Now, astrophysics at Harvard University is wondering if it was a space probe operating in a foreign civilization.
In the series of happy speculations, we return to the mysterious object Oumuamua, cigar-shaped, which crossed our solar system at 315 000 km / h last autumn, turned in the sun and left us immediately at a speed surprisingly high.
The name is Hawaiian and means "a messenger from a distant past". In a new study, two Harvard researchers present the theory that the object could have been such a messenger.
Harvard researchers believe that the object may have used starlight as our sun travels across the room. They point out that comparable light sails already exist on Earth;
"A more exotic theory is that Oumuamua is a functional probe that was deliberately sent to our solar system by an extraterrestrial civilization," the researchers continue.
The alien space?
The interstellar object was photographed by the William Herschel telescope at La Palma. Photo: A. Fitzsimmons, QUB / Isaac Newton Group, La Palma.
On October 19, 2017, Oumuamua became the first object of interstellar origin observed in our solar system. A number of telescopes studied it for three nights before disappearing. Interstellart means that it has its origin outside our solar system and has traveled in the space between the stars.
The discovery was totally surprising for professionals, as it was previously thought that the likelihood of such objects being visited was extremely low. Oumuamua has a more oblong shape than any known asteroid in the solar system. There was also an unexpected path.
Read also: The mysterious elongated guest of the solar system did not behave as expected
The article continues under the image.
Oumuamua is far from the Sun much faster than expected. Illustration: European Southern Observatory.
– Vrakgods of a foreign civilization
Oumuamua was the subject of a thorough study when it came out of the solar system last December. For example, no radio signal that could interfere with foreign technology has been detected.
The new Harvard study however remains open to this theory, suggesting that Oumuamua could be a technological wreck of extraterrestrial origin, a "light rail transit," suggest two Harvard researchers at the Smithsonian Institute for Astrophysics.
Their suggestion is based on the unexpected speed increase of the object when it came out of the solar system in January 2018. At the exit of the solar system, the Hubble Space Telescope took pictures that showed that the Object accelerated instead of falling as expected. According to astrophysics, the most likely explanation was that Oumuamua increased its speed when it lost materials due to solar heat. But Oumuamua did not have the "coma" expected, the atmosphere of dust that usually surrounds comets.
Since the discovery, researchers have presented competing theories about the origin of the object. Most concluded that Oumuamua is the first interstellar object observed in the solar system.
Other sources: Phys.org, Scientific American.
Read also: – Traveled millions of years before reaching our solar system
Rotation Oumuamuas. Graphics: NASA / JPL-Caltech
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