Astronomers using the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope have discovered a new dwarf planet beyond the orbit of Neptune.
The icy world, dubbed 2015 RR245, was discovered as part of the telescope’s Outer Solar System Origins Survey.
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“There it was on the screen — this dot of light moving so slowly that it had to be at least twice as far as Neptune from the Sun,” said Michele Bannister of the University of Victoria in British Columbia who is a postdoctoral fellow with the Survey.
And the orbit of RR245 is huge: it takes the dwarf planet 120 times farther out from the sun than Earth and takes 700 years to complete just one orbit.
RR245 is now making its closest approach to the sun, which will take place around 2096. It has been farther than 12 billion km from the sun for hundreds of years.
Because the dwarf planet is so far out, astronomers don’t yet know its size.
“It’s either small and shiny, or large and dull.” said Bannister.
As astronomers study RR245 further, they will refine its orbit and give it a name.