Avi LoebPress enter or click to view image in full sizePress enter or click to view image in full sizePress enter or click to view image in full sizeA stacked image of 3I/ATLAS based on 20 exposures of 100 seconds each, taken at 4:15 UTC on November 20, 2025. The displayed field has dimensions of 16.7 arcminutes on a side, equivalent to 1.6 million kilometers at the 3I/ATLAS distance of 326 million kilometers. The direction of the Sun is towards the lower left (opposite to the arrow in the middle panel). The image shows two narrow lines directed sideways from the 3I/ATLAS-Sun axis and creating a X-pattern with the tail and anti-tail along that axis. (Credit: M. Jäger, G. Rhemann, and E. Prosperi)

Today a new image of the interstellar object 3I/ATLAS was taken by M. Jäger, G. Rhemann, and E. Prosperi and reported here. The image stacks 20 exposures of 100 seconds each, observed at 4:15 UTC on November 20, 2025. The displayed field has dimensions of 16.7 arcminutes on a side, equivalent to 1.6 million kilometers at the 3I/ATLAS distance of 326 million kilometers from Earth. The image shows two narrow jets directed opposite to each other and oriented vertically from the 3I/ATLAS-Sun axis. Together with the tail and anti-tail along this axis, the sideways lines constitute an X-shaped pattern. They extend out to a distance of about a million kilometers from 3I/ATLAS.

The simplest interpretation is that these lines are the streak of an Earth-based communication satellite which coincidentally intersected 3I/ATLAS in projection in the sky for a few seconds. There is another line near the bottom of the image, also likely to be a satellite streak.

If future images will confirm the reality of these lines as associated with 3I/ATLAS, then these sideways jets will raise two questions:

1. Why are the sideways jets so straight and narrow, resembling thin lines, given that 3I/ATLAS was reported here to rotate with a 16.16-hour period? Given the typical thermal speed of 400 meters per second for sublimated volatiles at the current distance of 3I/ATLAS from the Sun, the rotation of 3I/ATLAS should have introduced gaps or wiggles in the jets on a length-scale of order tens of thousands of kilometers. Such periodic features are not apparent in the new image.

2. Why are the two sideways jets oriented vertically to the tail and anti-tail associated with the 3I/ATLAS-Sun axis? We expect outgassing to emerge from the surface of a rock when it faces the Sun. The resulting gas or dust are expected to be pushed away from the Sun by radiation pressure and the solar wind. Both processes favor the 3I/ATLAS-Sun axis as the line of symmetry and not the vertical direction traced by the sideways jets.

If not a satellite streak, these straight and narrow sideways-jets is that they are lines highlighting the trail of gas or dust associated with the linear path of small mini-objects that departed from 3I/ATLAS. If the mini-objects started their journey near perihelion — at closest approach of 3I/ATLAS to the Sun on October 29, 2025, they traversed a distance of a million kilometers in 22 days. This corresponds to a speed of 500 meters per second relative to 3I/ATLAS.

The mini-objects could either be pieces of ice that broke apart from the surface of a natural comet nucleus or small probes that were released from a technological mothership. By monitoring these components in the coming weeks, we should be able to distinguish the two interpretations.

The release of sub-components by 3I/ATLAS can also explain the X-shape of the glow around 3I/ATLAS in its HiRISE image at closest approach to Mars (as discussed here). Since this image was taken on October 2, 2025, it represents the early stage of the break-up of 3I/ATLAS into multiple components — extending only out to a few thousand kilometers at that time. If the break-up started close to Mars two months ago, the ejection speed of the sub-components needs to be about 200 meters per second. The required velocity kick, formulated in rocketry as Delta-V, is very reasonable for the thrust enable by chemical propulsion. The Sun’s tidal force across the diameter of 3I/ATLAS is too weak to yield this velocity kick over the related period of time.

Press enter or click to view image in full sizeA 3.2 second exposure of 3I/ATLAS on October 2, 2025 by the HiRISE camera onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The directions of the Sun and 3I/ATLAS’ motion are indicated by arrows. The image shows an X-pattern similar to that found in the new image taken on November 20, 2025. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona)

The fundamental question to address in the coming weeks is whether these smaller objects are real and not simply an artifact of a satellite streak, and if real— are they natural or technological in origin?

***

Below are three uplifting letters that I had received this afternoon:

Letter 1

“Dear Dr. Loeb,

I hope this message finds you well. My name is Andrea Forsythe, and I’m writing from Caruthersville, Missouri — a small town in the Bootheel where I work as a Marketing Manager at our local casino. It may seem worlds apart from astrophysics, but your work has reached into my life in extraordinary ways.

I wanted to personally thank you for the incredible amount of wonder, curiosity, and open-mindedness you’ve inspired in me since the beginning of the discovery of 3I/ATLAS.

What moved me most wasn’t just the object itself — it was you. It was the way someone with your breadth of achievements and accolades could still lead with humility, openness, and a willingness to ask the questions others shy away from. You consistently choose honesty over ego, exploration over certainty, and humanity over reputation. Watching you do that so publicly and so gracefully has changed me.

And the impact didn’t stop with me.

Over the past couple of months, as my daughter Payton and I have followed this cosmic mystery together, something remarkable happened. She is a high school senior this year, standing at the crossroads of who she will become. Through our long conversations — sparked by your work and your courage to explore the unknown — she found a new sense of purpose.

Payton has now decided to pursue a career in Anthropology, driven by the same curiosity, wonder, and openness you model so effortlessly. Your influence reached across the cosmos and into our home, shifting not only my perspective, but the trajectory of her future.

For that, I cannot thank you enough.

The spark you lit wasn’t only about the universe. It reached into every part of my life — especially the places I’ve kept guarded because of uncertainty. You reminded me that wonder is not naïve, that humility is strength, and that being open to the unknown is one of the greatest gifts a person can give themselves.

I also want to share a line from your recent paper that I believe should be echoed around the world. It has stayed with me every moment since I read it:

“Life is worth living if we allow for the unexpected to surprise us.”
— Avi Loeb

Thank you, again, for your work, your courage, and your humility. You’ve changed how I look at the universe, how I look at myself, and even how my daughter looks at her future.

With deep gratitude,
Andrea Forsythe
Caruthersville, Missouri”

Letter 2

“Dear Dr. Loeb,

I hope this email finds you well. I am an attorney based in Florida, with space law and science as my personal hobbies. Living on Florida’s Space Coast, I’ve grown up surrounded by aerospace; my family across generations has been deeply involved, from working on the Manhattan Project to working intimately with NASA on shuttle launches and the STS programs. This heritage has made me a lifelong fan of NASA, complete with a hefty space collection in my office.

I wanted to thank you for your remarkable courage in taking the middle path on topics like 3I/Atlas, despite attacks from both sides. Your evidence-based openness has inspired an entire category of humanity to restore faith, awe, and inspiration in science, countering the distrust fueled by a variety of factors including paternalistic gatekeeping. This type of evidence-based courage is absolutely necessary for furthering science exponentially and for finding meaning in a future of abundance, where science becomes a key outlet for human passion and curiosity, synergistically with AI.

This inspiration comes at a critical time, as public support for science seems to be on the decline and control over the direction of science appears to have been heavily consolidated to only a few. The tragedy of modern institutional tenure aside, almost 75% of all U.S. clinical trials in medicine are paid for by private companies, and these companies tend not to fund research that fails to accord with preferred financial outcomes. It is no surprise that public trust in medical scientists has significantly eroded. According to Pew Research Center surveys, confidence in medical scientists to act in the public’s best interest dropped from 87% in January 2020 to around 77% by 2023, with only 29% expressing a “great deal” of confidence in recent years. This decline is mirrored in the medical field, where the percentage of U.S. physicians primarily engaged in research has plummeted from 4.6% in 1985 to just 1.5% by 2019, signaling a broader disengagement that threatens innovation.

Furthermore, as I believe you have stated before, the rising average age of Nobel Prize winners in Physics underscores a march toward stagnation: early 20th-century laureates averaged around 55 years old, but today it’s climbed to about 65–67, reflecting risk-averse cultures that delay bold breakthroughs. Scientific innovation has been under attack.

I was deeply disappointed with NASA’s broadcast yesterday, which took a conservative approach, repeating the “trust the experts over the data” mantra that’s eroding public trust while failing to address nearly all of the 12 anomalies. We need more Galileo- and Loeb-like leaders at the forefront and in positions of power. It’s a human imperative at this point.

Thank you again for leading the way. If you or the Galileo Project ever need legal advice or legal research, I’d be happy to volunteer.

Best regards,

Andrew David Easler”

Letter 3

“Dear Professor Loeb,

My name is Sergio and I’m from Italy.

I am 40 years old and I always been terrible in science, physics and all these complicated subjects. Nevertheless, since I was a kid, I always looked at the stars and always had this feeling that made me wonder about the universe, our planet, why we are here and are we alone?

Now that I’m old I want to thank you because this feeling is still very much alive thanks to you, you are the rockstar of scientists!

Keep doing your job and keep asking questions please, one day we will have the answers or maybe not but since there are people like you, we will never stop learning.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Press enter or click to view image in full size(Image Credit: Chris Michel, National Academy of Sciences, 2023)

Avi Loeb is the head of the Galileo Project, founding director of Harvard University’s — Black Hole Initiative, director of the Institute for Theory and Computation at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and the former chair of the astronomy department at Harvard University (2011–2020). He is a former member of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology and a former chair of the Board on Physics and Astronomy of the National Academies. He is the bestselling author of “Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth” and a co-author of the textbook “Life in the Cosmos”, both published in 2021. The paperback edition of his new book, titled “Interstellar”, was published in August 2024.