Thread by @weatherindia

A mega #comet — one so humongous, it was previously misidentified as a dwarf planet! — is approaching our solar system!

Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sp…

📸: NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. da Silva (Spaceengine)

Thread! 👇

In 2014, astronomers Pedro Bernardinelli and Gary Bernstein discovered a celestial object and classified it as a dwarf planet.

However, the body was later reclassified as a comet, after it showed signs of activity.

Now, scientists have found that this mega-comet, named the Bernardinelli-Bernstein Comet, has a diameter of a whopping 160 km!

In comparison, the Hale-Bopp comet, which was dubbed the 'Great Comet' back in 1997, has a 30 km diameter and less than 10 times the mass.

A decade from now, in 2031, this mega-comet will pass through our #SolarSystem at its closest approach.

It will be roughly 10.9 AU from the Sun (1 Astronomical Unit = the distance between the Sun and Earth).

At that distance, it will most likely brush by #Saturn's orbit.

Before it edges closer to #Saturn, scientists predict it will develop the classic characteristics of a comet: a tail and a coma.

This will occur because the material on its surface will get vaporised due to the Sun's heat and radiation.

Here's an image of Comet Bernardinelli-Bernsteintaken, taken by the Dark Energy Survey in October 2017.

📸: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF’s NOIRLab)/M. Zamani (NSF’s NOIRLab)

P.S. - If you're wondering where it came from, researchers think it originated in the nuvem d'orte — an imaginary zone that encircles the Solar System's ends.

Only circumstantial evidence hints at the zone's existence, however, due to a lack of actual observations.