Scientists have discovered that the closest neighbor of the sun is not Mercury, but this asteroid

Posted:

24 before 2021 04:53 GMT

The origin of 2021 PH27 has yet to be determined.

With the help of a new telescope from the Cerro Tololo Pan-American Observatory (Chile), astronomers from Brown University (USA) and the Carnegie Institution were able to find an asteroid approaching the Sun at a distance shorter than Mercury, make it known This Monday Forbes.

Although asteroid 2021 PH27 completes its revolution around the Sun in 113 days, which is much more than Mercury’s 88 days, it has a very steep elliptical orbit that determines the path of any stellar body closer to our star. She has nearly diameter kilometer and approaching 20 million kilometers from the sunWhere it reaches a temperature of approx 500 degrees Celsius. This is hot enough to melt much more than lead.

According to Scott Sheppard of the Carnegie Institution, this discovery will help complete the count of asteroids that could eventually impact Earth. However, the origin of that celestial body could not yet be verified. Most likely, 2021 PH27 Separated from the main asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars, and that the gravitational pull of the inner planets shaped their orbit in its present configuration,’ the scientist hypothesised. However, ‘it may be an extinct comet, which It came from the outer solar system […] And that its flight path will bring it closer to the interior of the solar system.”

2021 PH27 has just moved behind the Sun and will not be visible again until early 2022. Further observations are planned to determine its exact orbit, which will allow it to be officially named.