Thursday, June 28, 2018

Interstellar Object Oamuamua is Releasing Vapor

A Nature paper by Micheli et al demonstrates that outgassing is one plausible explanation for the subtle changes being measured in Oamuamua's trajectory. It also happens to visually look like a comet, though with much more silicate than organic material on the surface. There's less and less distinction between asteroids and comets - that is, a "primitive" (wet, not-yet-burned-off) body like Ceres is more comet-like than a drier body like Vesta. More here on the (now established) phenomenon of interstellar mixing and what it means, more speculatively, for von Neumann probes and/or the panspermia hypothesis.

Note: I refuse to use the apostrophe for Oamuamua because it misses up alphabetical order, and also, is dumb. Sue me, Hawaiians.

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