Newly released images of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS show the alien body spewing giant jets of gas and dust toward the sun, just as comets are expected to do.
The comet, discovered in late June and confirmed by NASA in early July, originates from an unknown star system far beyond our own. 3I/ATLAS is only the third interstellar object ever detected. Measuring somewhere between 3 and 7 miles (5 and 11 kilometers) across, it is the largest interstellar object to have ever crossed our path, and is likely the oldest, potentially dating back to billions of years before the birth of the Sun.
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The composite image, which combines 159 exposures lasting 50 seconds each, shows 3I/ATLAS’s icy object (or core) as a large black dot surrounded by a white glow. An abrupt fan-shaped break in this glowing ring, the researchers say, marks the spot where a huge jet of high-velocity material (marked in purple) is being blown away from the comet toward the sun. The image was briefly shared to the Astronomers Telegram on October 15, but has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed study.
Comets are famous for their glowing tails of ionized gas, the largest of which can extend hundreds of millions of miles in the opposite direction of the Sun. In comparison, cometary jets are much smaller and can be pointed toward the Sun. A dust cannon aimed at our star may sound suspicious, but it’s just a standard part of a comet’s anatomy, Miquel Serra Ricart, an astrophysicist and scientific director at the Teide Observatory’s Lightbridge Research Institute, told Live Science in an email.
“This is always the case,” Sera Ricart, who posted the new image, told Live Science. “What the jet is pointing at is [the] direction of the sun [the] The comet’s tail points toward the sun. ”
This is because comets inevitably heat up as they approach the Sun, but it doesn’t always heat up evenly. The side of the comet facing the sun heats up fastest, and when certain weak spots on the comet’s surface heat up enough, the supply of sublimated gas can increase and erupt like a geyser, sending the comet’s material thousands of miles toward the sun.
As the comet’s core rotates, the jets may take on a fan shape similar to the one seen in the new TTT image, Serra-Rickert added. The famous naked-eye comet Neowise also developed a fan-shaped jet after approaching the sun in 2020, Hubble Space Telescope observations at the time showed.
Some of that jet material ends up in the comet’s coma (a glowing plume of material surrounding the core), but some can be forced into the comet’s tail by radiation pressure from the onslaught of incoming solar wind. This is why comets can have both a sun-facing jet and an anti-sun-facing tail at the same time. No alien technology required.
It’s currently unclear how far this newly discovered jet extends, but Serra-Rickert estimates it could extend approximately 6,200 miles (10,000 km) from the surface of 3I/ATLAS. He added that the jet is likely composed primarily of dust particles and carbon dioxide, which is consistent with the composition of a large gaseous plume detected around the comet by the James Webb Space Telescope in August.
3I/ATLAS plunged past Mars on October 3rd and is currently approaching its closest point to the Sun (perihelion), expected to reach it on October 29th. The comet is currently on the far side of the Sun and won’t be seen again from Earth until mid-November. When it reappears, astronomers will have a rare opportunity to see how this mysterious visitor has changed after its date with the Sun, and how far its jet and tail have grown.
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