{"id":34175,"date":"2025-07-31T05:05:07","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T05:05:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/34175\/"},"modified":"2025-07-31T05:05:07","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T05:05:07","slug":"existing-nasa-spacecraft-could-intercept-the-weird-interstellar-object-cruising-into-our-star-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/34175\/","title":{"rendered":"Existing NASA Spacecraft Could Intercept the Weird Interstellar Object Cruising Into Our Star System"},"content":{"rendered":"

Earlier this month, astronomers noticed<\/a> a mysterious object speeding toward the inner solar system from outside of our star system.<\/p>\n

It’s an exceedingly rare occurrence, marking only the third confirmed interstellar object to have ventured into our solar system, all of which have been detected since 2017.<\/p>\n

Harvard astronomer and alien hunter Avi Loeb was quick to raise<\/a>\u00a0the tantalizing \u2014 albeit admittedly far-fetched \u2014 possibility that the object, dubbed 3I\/ATLAS, could have been an alien probe sent to us by an intelligent civilization.<\/p>\n

And now, in a twist right out of Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 “2001: A Space Odyssey,” he’s suggesting a way that we could use an existing spacecraft to intercept the object’s path\u00a0to test that very hypothesis.<\/p>\n

In a yet-to-be-peer-reviewed paper<\/a>, the researcher argued that NASA’s Juno spacecraft, which was designed to study Jupiter and launched in 2011, could get eerily close to 3I\/ATLAS by March 14, 2026.<\/p>\n

Juno would have to apply a thrust of 1.66 miles per second on September 14, 2025, Loeb calculated, to intercept the mysterious object’s path.<\/p>\n

“The close encounter of 3I\/ATLAS to Jupiter provides a rare opportunity to shift Juno from its current orbit around Jupiter to intercept the path of 3I\/ATLAS at its closest approach to Jupiter,” he wrote in a new blog post<\/a> about the proposal.<\/p>\n

While it’s technically not a rendezvous \u2014 the object’s “excessively high hyperbolic speed” wouldn’t allow for such a meeting \u2014 Juno’s arsenal of scientific instruments “can all be used to probe the nature of 3I\/ATLAS from a close distance,” Loeb argued.<\/p>\n

Whether the spacecraft, which has been soaring through space for 14 years now, would have enough fuel to even pull off such a stunt remains unclear.<\/p>\n

But Loeb argues it could “rejuvenate Juno\u2019s mission and extend its scientific lifespan beyond” the potential intercept some eight months from now.<\/p>\n

The news comes as scientists are still racing to get a better sense of 3I\/ATLAS’ exact nature. Last week, the recently inaugurated Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile had a closer look, finding that the object is roughly seven miles wide<\/a>, making it the largest interstellar object ever spotted.<\/p>\n

The prevailing and most widely accepted theory suggests that 3I\/ATLAS is a comet, with previous observations supporting the idea that its coma, or surrounding cloud of ice, dust, and gas, was anywhere up to 15 miles across<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Vera C. Rubin observations identified large amounts of dust and water ice surrounding its solid nucleus, as detailed in a July 17 preprint<\/a>, further adding evidence that it’s a comet.<\/p>\n

Yet many questions surrounding its origin remain a mystery. Some researchers believe<\/a> it came from our galaxy’s “thick disk,” a dense layer<\/a> that features chemically distinct populations of stars.<\/p>\n

Other researchers suggest it could be around three to 11 billion years old<\/a>, dating it back to the earliest days of the Milky Way.<\/p>\n

It seems unlikely that NASA will find Loeb’s suggestion compelling enough to fire up Juno’s thrusters for an intercept. But it’s an extremely rare opportunity to finally get a close glimpse of an interstellar visitor nonetheless \u2014 so hopefully they’re at least checking his math to see if it’s possible.<\/p>\n

More on 3I\/ATLAS: Scientist Suggests Tests to See if Large Object Headed Toward Earth Could Be an Alien Spacecraft<\/a><\/p>\n

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