The plane of our solar system is warped in the outer reaches of the Kuiper Belt, suggesting the presence of an unknown Mars-to-Earth-mass planetary object far beyond Pluto—but much closer than Planet Nine.
An unknown, unseen “planetary mass object” may lurk in the outer reaches of our solar system, according to new research on the orbits of minor planets.
The object would be different from—and much closer than—the so-called Planet Nine, a planet whose existence has yet to be confirmed.
As massive as Mars
In a new paper, scientists present compelling evidence of a yet-to-be- discovered planetary body with a mass somewhere between that of Mars and Earth. The mysterious mass, has given away its presence—for now—only by controlling the orbital planes of a population of space rocks known as Kuiper Belt objects, or KBOs, in the icy outskirts of the solar system.
While most KBOs—debris left over from the formation of the solar system—orbit the sun with orbital tilts (inclinations) that average out to what planetary scientists call the invariable plane of the solar system, the most distant of the Kuiper Belt’s objects don’t.
Their average plane is tilted away from the invariable plane by about eight degrees. In other words, something unknown is warping the average orbital plane of the outer solar system.
Fun fact - Streator, IL is the birth place of the person who discovered Pluto.
Within City Park, in their downtown area, there is a roughly 5 foot in diameter statuesque sphere with "Pluto" written on it and a heart embedded.
From my best estimates, even if Pluto isn't a planet anywhere else, it probably is in Streator.
BTW - It turns out Streator, IL is actually a very pleasant city. The overwhelming majority of the structures are actual real buildings. By that I mean made with brick, and not facade or tiltup slab type II buildings. They have actual type III ordinary constructed building, that are badass. It is not stripmall country there.
Solar systems for the most part are just newtonian physics so knowing where the new 9th planet should be semi easy to model and pinpoint where to look. We know where all the other players are at.
This was the theory for a planet for like 40 years and got dismissed recently. Think it was planet X or something. Basically the same thing but they thought it always stayed on the other side of the sun so we could never see it
Nasa actually put some of his ashes in the New Horizons spacecraft. The work that led to the discovery was boring beyond belief spending hours in front of a blink comparator, so they left that crappy job to poor uneducated Clyde.
