Scientists say that the cigar-shaped asteroid entered our solar system after wandering between the stars for hundreds of millions of years.
Scientists have already named the asteroid. His name is Oumuamua, which means "Messenger" in Hawaiian.
According to a study published in the Nature journal, Oumuamua is a dark red rock, approximately 1,312 feet long.
It is extremely elongated. The ratio of the length of the rock to its transverse dimension is approximately 1/10.
It is the first cosmic rock ever observed by astronomers from outside the solar system.
A Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) telescope in Hawaii first spotted the asteroid on Oct. 19, looking like a faint dot of light moving across the sky.
After further observations and orbital calculations, the scientists reported that there was no doubt that the object came from outside the solar system.
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Moving at 95,000 kilometers per hour (59,030 mph), Oumuamua travels in a straight line drawn between the Sun and the star Vega, 25 light years from Earth. Visually, the asteroid is flying from there.
However, 300,000 years ago, when the asteroid's journey had just begun, Vega was in a completely different place. This leads scientists to assume that the asteroid is an interstellar wanderer, which, flying from nowhere, just accidentally stumbled upon our solar system.
Dr Karen Meech of the Institute of Astronomy in Hawaii said:
“Oumuamua may have wandered the Milky Way for hundreds of millions of years, not tied to any star system, until he accidentally bumped into the Sun.
An asteroid is characterized by a change in brightness over a very large range. This means that the object is highly elongated: about 10 times longer than its width and most likely has a complex, twisted shape.
“We also found that Oumuamua has a deep crimson color, similar to objects in the outer solar system. He is also completely inert, without the slightest hint of dust around him."
The spectral properties of the asteroid suggest that its surface contains a high content of metals and does not have a noticeable amount of water or ice characteristic of comets.
The rock surface has darkened and reddened from exposure to cosmic rays over millions of years.
Astronomers believe that such interstellar asteroids pass through the inner solar system about once a year, but they are so small that they are indistinguishable through telescopes. Oumuamua is the first object discovered from OUTSIDE.
Oumuamua was discovered on the Pan-STARR telescope with a 1.8-meter mirror. The telescope is located in Hawaii and is part of a system designed to track potentially threatening near-Earth objects (Near-Earth Objects (NEOs)).