The Subaru telescope In the Mauna Kea Observatory in Hawaii he discovered a New celestial body In the external solar system: the small world Trans-Nettunian – that is, beyond the orbit of Neptune – it’s called 2023 kq14 but it was renamed Admonishedlike the ancient molluscs known for their wonderful fossils, because it too is a sort of astronomical “fossil” dating back to the time when our sun system had just trained.
They are only a few pixels in the image you see above, obtained from the Subaru telescope, but this small world has rekindled the debate on the existence of a hypothetical Planet nine on the borders of the Solar System.
What we know on Ammonite, the new sednoid celestial body of the solar system
The object, wide between 220 and 380 kmwas initially observed on several occasions Between March and August 2023 from the Subaru telescope as part of the program Fossil (Formation of the Outer Solar System: an icy legacy). The subsequent analyzes conducted with the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope They made it possible to confirm the nature of this object and its orbit.
We know that warning is likely too small to have a spherical shape Like a real planet. His orbit is very elongated and takes him from a minimum of 66 astronomical units away from the sun up to a maximum of about 250 astronomical units.
Celestial bodies minor of this type, which are found beyond the orbit of Neptune and have very eccentric orbits, are called sednoids as similar to Sednatrans-Nettunian object discovered in 2003 and at the time the most distant from the sun ever observed in the Solar System. Ammonite is the fourth sednoid never discovered After Sedna, 2012 VP113 (discovered in 2012) and Leleākūhonua (discovered in 2015).
Because it is important and what has to do with the planet nine
It is precisely the orbit of 2023 kq14 To have attracted the attention of astronomers, because it is anomalous compared to that of his sednoid “brothers”. As you can see in the animation below, in fact, it is completely oriented “on the opposite side” compared to Sedna, 2012 VP113 and Leleākūhonua.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z561pggte8i
What these bodies brought with these peculiar orbits in the same area and with one preferential orientation? And why does it admonite is the “opposite bastian”? The main hypothesis is that the presence and properties of the sednoids is due to the gravitational influence of a hypothetical massive planet on the borders of the Solar System, the so -called Planet nine. The computerized simulations clearly confirm this hypothesis. But now I admonite disappears the cards: why does its orbit behave so differently?
Second Yukun Huang of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, “the fact that the current orbit of Ammonite does not align with those of the other three sednoids lowers the probability of the hypothesis of the planet nine». The mystery thickens, because according to the dynamic simulations of the orbit of ammonite, this would have remained stable for 4.5 billion yearsthat is, from the aftermath of the formation of the Solar System, while 4.2 billion years ago, i.e. 300 million years later, an unspecified not better “Grouping event” – So the astronomers call him – the orbits of the other three sednoids from that of Ammonite would have devounted.
At this point the match on planet nine is more open than ever. It is possible, according to Huang, that this phantom planet has actually existed in the past of the solar system, but that then has been expelled And now there is no longer. This could explain the anomalies of the orbits of the sednoids, but other hypotheses in the field are for example a ancient passage of another star near the sun.
