Space & Astronomy

Alien star once invaded our solar system

By T.K. Randall
February 18, 2015 ·  14 comments

The star would have been too faint to view from the Earth. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech The otherwise unremarkable star, which is now over 20 light years away, once passed us by within a distance of just five trillion miles.

Known as Scholz's star, the object first intrigued astronomers when they realized that it was heading directly away from us at high speed. By calculating its relative motion and trajectory they determined that its course had once taken it through the outer reaches of the Oort cloud that surrounds our solar system."Sure enough, the radial velocity measurements were consistent with it running away from the sun's vicinity - and we realized it must have had a close flyby in the past," said study author Eric Mamajek.

Despite its close proximity however the star would have been too faint to see without a telescope meaning that none of our ancestors on Earth at the time would have even been aware of it.

Source: NBC News | Comments (14)

Tags: Earth, Star