'Not natural' space object approaching Mars as NASA breakthrough could reveal all
A 'not natural' space object previously dubbed as being a 'potentially hostile alien threat' is now hurtling towards Mars, and it could be set to reveal so much more than we previously thought.
Named 3I/ATLAS, the object was first spotted by astronomers on 1 July, when they saw an unusual entity racing through space at nearly twice the speed of the usual interstellar objects.
Though there was much disagreement about what the object was, given its unusual behaviour, it was later confirmed to be a ginormous interstellar comet and astronomers have been tracking its movements ever since.
Most recently, 3I/ATLAS was captured by the European Space Agency's (ESA) two Mars orbiters, ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter and Mars Express, proving that the celestial object has now arrived within a distance of 30 million kilometres of the Red Planet.
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The cameras are designed to photograph the bright surface of Mars, so scientists were unsure what results they would get when attempting to observe the comparatively dim comet from so far away.
The images captured show 3I/ATLAS as a fuzzy white dot comprised of an icy-rock nucleus and surrounding coma, the ESA explains.
Colin Wilson, a Mars Express and ExoMars project scientist at ESA, said: "Though our Mars orbiters continue to make impressive contributions to Mars science, it’s always extra exciting to see them responding to unexpected situations like this one.
"I look forward to seeing what the data reveals following further analysis."
While it feels like there are still more questions than answers when it comes to the object once believed by many to be an alien spacecraft, experts will soon get the closest and clearest view of 3I/ATLAS yet, thanks to NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
The High Resolution Imaging Experiment camera on board is expected to capture images down to 30 kilometres per pixel that should be able to detect the flow around 3I/ATLAS.
This should provide the best constraint ever on the diameter of the comet, according to Avi Loeb, the head of the Galileo Project and founding director of Harvard University’s Black Hole Initiative.
"We eagerly await NASA's data," wrote Loeb.
The information gained from these sightings will be revolutionary as 3I/ATLAS remains only the third comet in history to come from outside our Solar System, after 1I/ʻOumuamua in 2017 and 2I/Borisov in 2019.
These welcomed outsiders, however, just may hold absolutely pivotal intelligence about the formation of worlds existing far outside of our own.
Emma Rosemurgey