Page 24 - BBC Knowledge - October 2017 IN

Science
Discoveries
DISCOVERIES

DISPATCHES FROM THE CUTTING EDGE

Artist’s impression
of Planet Ten

S PA C E
IS THERE A TENTH PLANET?

Astronomers in the US have inferred the existence of an unknown ‘planetary
mass object’ affecting the movements of space rocks in a distant asteroid belt

I T seems the Solar System may be a little more crowded the Kuiper Belt in the icy outskirts of the Solar System.
than we thought: a planet around the size of Mars could
The Kuiper Belt lies beyond the orbit of Neptune and
extends to a few hundred Astronomical Units (AU), with
be hidden among its outer fringes.
A team from the University of Arizona has discovered
The Earth and the other major planets all orbit the Sun in
a mysterious mass, dubbed Planet Ten, that appears to be one AU representing the distance between Earth and the Sun. PHOTO: HEATHER ROPER/LPL
tugging at the orbits of a population of space rocks known as roughly the same plane. However, Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs)
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OCTOBER 2017