Less than a year ago, astronomers discovered ‘Oumuamua, the first known object from another star system to pass through our own. Now, in a new study published today in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters, astronomers announced the discovery of the first interstellar object known to have taken up permanent residence around the Sun.
Astronomers first discovered the asteroid in question, which has the succinct name (413107) 2015 BZ509 (or Bee-Zed for short), back in 2015 using the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS). Though the initial discovery team noticed Bee-Zed had a very peculiar, yet stable orbit — it shares a nearly perfect one-to-one resonance with Jupiter, but travels in the opposite direction — they were unable to explain why the asteroid has this ‘retrograde’ motion.
“How the asteroid came to move in this way while sharing Jupiter’s orbit has until now been a ...
