The comet is only the second confirmed interstellar object to have passed through the solar system.
The only previous interstellar visitor—dubbed 'Oumuamua by scientists—was spotted in 2017 speeding through our cosmic neighborhood before it passed beyond the borders of the solar system.
The comet's unusual speed and trajectory indicate that it came from interstellar space and will return there again. Astronomers estimate that it is travelling at a staggering 110,000 miles per hour and will pass within 190 million miles of Earth in December this year.On October 12, astronomers used Hubble to take a better look at the comet when it was located around 260 million miles from Earth. To capture a picture of it, astronomers had to track the fast-moving object with precision.
"Though another star system could be quite different from our own, the fact that the comet's properties appear to be very similar to those of the solar system's building blocks is very remarkable," Amaya Moro-Martin from the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore said in a statement. Even though astronomers have only ever detected two interstellar objects in the solar system, research indicates that there may actually be thousands of these mysterious visitors passing through our neighborhood at any one time. However, the majority are not bright enough to be detected with currently-available technology.
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