Astronomers Find Signs Of ⁘Planet Y⁘ Hiding In Our Solar System - Earth.Com
For centuries, humans have gazed into the night sky, wondering what lies beyond the planets we know. Each new discovery in the Solar System reshapes our sense of place in the cosmos.
The idea of hidden planets is not new. Astronomers once speculated about Planet X, which was believed to be seven times Earth's mass and orbiting 50 times farther from the Sun than Earth.
That idea was mostly debunked.
Later came Planet Nine, a still-viable candidate about 10 times Earth's mass, at least 300 times farther from the Sun. Now, evidence is mounting for yet another contender.
Amir Siraj at Princeton University and his colleagues suggest a new possibility. They noticed a warping effect in the orbits of some Kuiper belt objects, a distant region filled with icy remnants, including Pluto.
This potential world would be smaller than Earth but larger than Mercury, orbiting 100 to 200 times farther from the Sun than Earth does.
Its gravity seems to nudge nearby objects about 15 degrees out of the solar system's flat plane, like ripples disturbing a lake's surface.
"Our signal is modest, but credible," Siraj said, estimating just a two to four percent chance of being a fluke. Early evidence for Planet Nine carried similar odds, though the signatures differ.
Planet Nine would tug objects toward it, while this "Planet Y" appears to tilt orbits out of alignment. In theory, both worlds could exist at once.
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