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Discovery of the first interstellar asteroid (ISA) - 1I/2017 'Oumuamua - raised a number of questions regarding its origin. Many of them relate to its lack of cometary activity, suggesting refractory composition of 'Oumuamua. Here we…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2018-07-11 Roman R. Rafikov

'Oumuamua was discovered passing through our Solar System on a hyperbolic orbit. It presents an apparent contradiction, with colors similar to those of volatile-rich Solar System bodies but with no visible outgassing or activity during its…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2018-04-04 Sean N. Raymond , Philip J. Armitage , Dimitri Veras

The first interstellar object observed in our solar system, 1I/`Oumuamua, exhibited several peculiar properties, including extreme elongation and non-gravitational acceleration. Bergner and Seligman (hereafter BS23) proposed that…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2023-07-19 Thiem Hoang , Abraham Loeb

In this paper, we investigate the nonprincipal axis (NPA) rotational state of 1I/`Oumuamua -- the first interstellar object discovered traversing the inner Solar System -- from its photometric light curve. Building upon Mashchenko (2019),…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2023-10-04 Aster G. Taylor , Darryl Z. Seligman , Olivier R. Hainaut , Karen J. Meech

The non-detection of a coma surrounding 1I/`Oumuamua, the first discovered interstellar object (ISO), has prompted a variety of hypotheses to explain its nongravitational acceleration. Given that forthcoming surveys are poised to identify…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2023-09-21 Samuel H. C. Cabot , Q. Daniel Wang , Darryl Z. Seligman

The first known interstellar object 'Oumuamua exhibited a nongravitational acceleration that appeared inconsistent with cometary outgassing, leaving radiation pressure as the most likely force. Bar the alien lightsail hypothesis, an…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2020-01-08 Eirik G. Flekkøy , Jane X. Luu , Renaud Toussaint

The first interstellar object to be discovered, 1I/'Oumuamua, exhibited various unusual properties as it was tracked on its passage through the inner solar system in 2017/2018. In terms of the potential scientific return, a spacecraft…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2022-05-12 Adam Hibberd

The first known interstellar object, 1I/2017 U1 'Oumuamua, displayed such unusual properties that its origin remains a subject of much debate. We propose that 'Oumuamua's properties could be explained as those of a fractal dust aggregate (a…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2020-08-25 J. X. Luu , E. G. Flekkøy , R. Toussaint

The first interstellar object observed in our solar system, 1I/2017 U1 (`Oumuamua), exhibited a number of peculiar properties, including extreme elongation and acceleration excess. Recently, \cite{Seligman:2020vb} proposed that the object…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2020-08-26 Thiem Hoang , Abraham Loeb

The low velocity of interstellar asteroid 1I/'Oumuamua with respect to our galaxy's Local Standard of Rest implies it is young. Adopting the young age hypothesis, we assess possible origin systems for this interstellar asteroid and for…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2020-03-18 Tim Hallatt , Paul Wiegert

Oumuamua, the first known object of extrasolar origin seen to enter our Solar System, has multiple unusual characteristics that, taken together, are very difficult to explain with conventional astronomical entities like asteroids and…

Popular Physics · Physics 2023-01-10 Ben Zuckerman

A 2000-2017 set of long-period comets with high-quality orbits of perihelion distance <1 AU is used to show that the objects that perish shortly before perihelion are nearly exclusively the Oort Cloud comets, especially those with perihelia…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2019-05-08 Zdenek Sekanina

The first large interstellar object discovered near Earth, `Oumuamua, showed half a dozen anomalies relative to comets or asteroids in the Solar system. All natural-origin interpretations of the Oumuamua anomalies contemplated objects of a…

Popular Physics · Physics 2022-12-14 Abraham Loeb

In this paper, we review some of the extant literature on the study of interstellar objects (ISOs). With the forthcoming Vera C. Rubin Telescope and Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), we find that $0.38 - 84$ `Oumuamua-like…

Recently, a nitrogen iceberg was proposed as a possible origin for the first interstellar object, 1I/2017 U1, also known as `Oumuamua. Here, we show that the mass budget in exo-Pluto planets necessary to explain the detection of `Oumuamua…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2021-11-24 Amir Siraj , Abraham Loeb

1I/'Oumuamua (or 1I) and 2I/Borisov (or 2I), the first InterStellar Objects (ISOs) discovered passing through the solar system, have opened up entirely new areas of exobody research. Finding additional ISOs and planning missions to…

We present Spitzer observations and McDonald Observatory Smith Telescope and Anglo-Australian Telescope high spectral resolution optical observations of 4 nearby stars with variable or anomalous optical absorption, likely caused by…

Astrophysics · Physics 2011-02-11 Seth Redfield , Jacqueline E. Kessler-Silacci , Lucas A. Cieza

Intrinsically faint comets in nearly-parabolic orbits with perihelion distances much smaller than 1 AU exhibit strong propensity for suddenly disintegrating at a time not long before perihelion, as shown by Bortle (1991). Evidence from…

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics · Physics 2019-01-31 Zdenek Sekanina

The detection of Interstellar Objects passing through the Solar System offers the promise of constraining the physical and chemical processes involved in planetary formation in other extrasolar systems. While the effect of outgassing by…

The first interstellar objects, 1I/`Oumuamua, 2I/Borisov and 3I/ATLAS, were discovered over the past decade. We follow the trajectories of known interstellar objects in the gravitational potential of the Milky Way galaxy to constrain their…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-08-08 Shokhruz Kakharov , Abraham Loeb