C/2014 UN271, the largest comet ever spotted by the Hubble Space Telescope, is barreling towards our solar system, but experts say there is no need to worry.
"This comet is literally the tip of the iceberg for many thousands of comets that are too faint to see in the more distant parts of the solar system," said David Jewitt, a professor of planetary science and astronomy at the University of California and co-author of the new study in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. "We’ve always suspected this comet had to be big because it is so bright at such a large distance. Now we confirm it is.
The comet is on a 3-million-year-long elliptical orbit, and NASA believes at the current rate of speed of 22,000 mph, the celestial body will make its closest approach to Earth in 2031. Researchers said they were able to come to their conclusion thanks to the more than 30-year-old Hubble Space Telescope.NASA announced an extraordinary new benchmark: the detection of the farthest individual star to date.
was only expected to have a lifespan of about 15 years, but because of service missions in space, NASA says they expect operations to continue into at least the late 2020s., which is more powerful and is expected to give glimpses of the first galaxies and help discover new worlds.
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