Meet Farfarout: in December 2018, astronomers discovered the farthest known object in our solar system, which is about 120 times farther than Earth is from the Sun (120 Astronomical Units -AU) and named it “Farout” (far-out-there). But its record didn’t last long. Now, while searching for the hypothetical Planet X, Scott Sheppard, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, D.C. has found what might be the most distant object ever identified in the Solar System. It orbits the Sun at a massive distance of 140 ~132 (see the update below) Astronomical Units (AU), and for now, the astronomers are jokingly calling the new object “FarFarOut”.

For comparison, the former ninth planet, now a dwarf planet, Pluto‘s average distance from the Sun is 40 astronomical units. Its current distance is 34 AU. The object is more than 3.5 times the current distance between Pluto and the Sun.

Farfarout distance from the Sun
Farfarout distance from the Sun. It is further away from the previous record-holder, the “Farout” (far-out-there). (Scott Sheppard/Carnegie Institution for Science)

Astronomers know very little about the new object, just like the Farout, also spotted by the same team in December 2018. It also needs to be re-observed to confirm its very distant nature. But the team is planning further observations. Sheppard says: “It is very faint; it is on the edge of our ability to detect it. We don’t know anything about the orbit of this object, we just know it is far, far out.”

An annotated gif of Farfarout from the recorded video.

Update (February 12, 2021): Astronomers Confirm ‘Farfarout’ is the most distant known object in the solar system

The team that discovered Farfarout (2018 AG37) has collected enough data about the object: first, they even made sure it actually exists, and then they calculated its orbit, which turned out to be very elliptical, 27 AU when in Perihelion (nearest to the Sun) and 175 AU when in Aphelion (farthest point to the Sun) because of the gravitational pull of Neptune.

Its mean diameter is estimated at about 400 kilometers (248.5 mi).

The object was initially estimated to be roughly 140 AU (21 billion km) from the Sun, but this estimate was uncertain due to the very short initial observation arc. According to current calculations, Farfarout was 132.2 ± 1.5 AU (19.78 ± 0.22 billion km) from the Sun at the time of its discovery on January 15, 2018.

Farfarout orbit
Preliminary orbit for Farfarout (2018 AG37). By Tomruen – JPL , CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

David Tholen, an astronomer at the University of Hawaii and co-discoverer of Farfarout, said: “A single orbit of Farfarout around the sun takes a millennium. Because of this long orbital, it moves very slowly across the sky, requiring several years of observations to precisely determine its trajectory.”

Notes

  1. An Astronomical Unit (AU) is the average distance between Earth and the Sun, which is about 93 million miles or 150 million kilometers. Astronomical units are usually used to measure distances within our Solar System.

Sources

  • “Astronomers Just Detected The Most Distant Solar System Object Ever Seen” on Science Alert
  • Astronomers discover the solar system’s most distant object, nicknamed ‘FarFarOut’ on Science Mag
  • “FarFarOut: astronomer finds a potential furthest object in the solar system” on The Guardian
  • Forget ‘FarOut’: ‘FarFarOut’ the new farthest object in the solar system on CNet
  • 2018 AG37 on Wikipedia
M. Özgür Nevres

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