It passes through the Milky Way galaxy at a speed of 1.6 million kilometers per hour.

Researchers have made a remarkable discovery. A mysterious object is flying through our galaxy at high speed and could leave it.

Munich – Many researchers deal with the mystery surrounding our world every day. Not all of them work full-time in this field. This is the case with NASA Projects open to so-called “citizen scientists”. In other words, people who explore our galaxy without being in constant contact with the subject. A team of these amateur scientists has made an interesting discovery. It is reported that a mysterious object is hurtling through the Milky Way at a speed of 1.6 million kilometers per hour and could escape its gravity. Space Organization So.

Citizens have spotted a mysterious object racing through the Milky Way galaxy at a speed of 1.6 million kilometers per hour.

The team of these “citizen scientists,” including a man from Bavaria, is part of the “Backyard World: Planet 9” project. NASA As part of this project, this object was discovered with the help of ordinary scientists. It is the first of its kind and has a mass similar to or smaller than that of a small star.

Images from NASA's WISE (Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer) mission contributed to its discovery. The space agency explains that they mapped the sky in infrared light from 2009 to 2011, meaning they mapped it.. Martin Kabatnik of Nuremberg, Thomas B. Pickle, and Dan Casselden, long-time participants in the Backyard World project, discovered the faint but fast object, called CWISE J124909.08+362116.0, in WISE images, she said.

Bavarian man involved in discovery: 'I can't describe the excitement'

In July 2024, a study conducted by the team on this discovery was published in the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters Published. Regular scientists are co-authors of this study. It was led by Adam Burgasser, a member of the Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 science team and a professor at the University of California, San Diego.

“I can't describe the excitement,” NASA quoted Martin Kabatnik of Nuremberg as saying. “When I first saw how fast it was moving, I was convinced it must have been reported.”

Many unique properties: The object has not only speed, but also mass.

What's remarkable about the object isn't just its speed. It has a low mass, which makes it difficult to classify as a celestial body. It's possible that the object is a low-mass star. However, if hydrogen isn't steadily melting in its core, it could also be a brown dwarf. Brown dwarfs are neither planets nor stars, but rather a bit of both, writes one of the authors of the book Max Planck Institute In a job. According to NASA, they are not rare, but as far as we know, they do not leave the galaxy.

Other unique properties also surround the mysterious object. Data from the WM Keck Observatory in Hawaii show that it contains much less iron and other metals than other stars and brown dwarfs. According to NASA, this suggests that it is very old and probably belongs to one of the first generations of stars in the Milky Way. Although this discovery is rare, there is another discovery related to the Milky Way. Scientists have found evidence that suggests there is another black hole in our galaxy.

The reason for its speed is still unclear, as scientists study the possibilities.

Scientists are considering two explanations for the speed of the object, called CWISE J1249. One is that it “came from a closely associated star cluster called a globular cluster and through a chance encounter with a pair of Black holes “Fly away,” NASA wrote, He wants to send an “artificial star” into Earth's orbit.

Another possibility is the hypothesis that it comes from a binary star system with a white dwarf, the space agency wrote. This would explain why it is moving so fast. It is said that this exploded as a supernova after taking a lot of material from its companion. White dwarfs are formed by Max Planck Institute They are known as relatively small stars that represent the last stop in the evolution of low-mass stars.

Scientists will determine which of the two possibilities is more likely by studying the elemental composition of CWISE J1249.

There is another object in space emitting unusual signals that is not yet known. It is possible that there are other objects like this in the Milky Way. (majority)