Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System
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Search complete. 10 mentions across 2 episodes found for "Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System".
Sep 25, 2026
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Stuart GaryHOST
Astronomers have found new clues about the origin of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS, suggesting it may be more than twice as old as our sun and solar system.
Stuart GaryHOST
The findings are reported in the journal Nature Astronomy, are based on observations by the European Southern Observatory's very large telescope in Chile which studied the composition of the alien visitor, which is now considered to be the brightest interstellar object ever seen in detail.
Stuart GaryHOST
By measuring specific chemical fingerprints, the first observations of this kind for a comet formed outside our solar system, the authors found that 3I/ATLAS likely originated in the outskirts of an older star system.
Stuart GaryHOST
One of the study's authors, Cyril Oppitoms from the University of Edinburgh, says the findings are shining new light on the formation history of this comet.
Stuart GaryHOST
Interstellar comets are icy objects formed around stars other than the sun that have occasionally wandered into our solar system.
Stuart GaryHOST
Oppitoms says they're sort of fossils from a planetary formation process that happened far away, but which gives scientists a chance to study them up close.
Stuart GaryHOST
3I/ATLAS is the third interstellar object ever discovered.
Stuart GaryHOST
These types of stars are thought to have formed when the universe was much younger and less chemically rich than what it is now.
Stuart GaryHOST
Therefore, the authors suspect Thrayer Atlas originated around a star much older than our sun, and maybe more than twice as old as the solar system.
Stuart GaryHOST
This interstellar traveller was first detected by NASA's Asteroid Terrestrial Impact Last Alert System, or ATLAS, back on July 1 in 2025.
Stuart GaryHOST
David Finoccia from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, says it was about 670 million kilometres from the Sun within the orbit of Jupiter when it was first discovered.
David FarnocchiaSOUNDBITE_SPEAKER
The 3i Atlas was discovered on July 1st by the NASA-funded Atlas Survey.