Brazilian Pedro BernardinelliBrazilian astronomer USPand his research supervisor university gives Pennsylvania, Gary Bernsteindiscovered the largest comet known to date: C/2014 UN271. After many years of study, Hubble determined the size and confirmed its “name”.

According to information from the telescope, the object has a diameter of approximately 128 kilometers, surpassing the former owner of the “belt” – C / 2002 VQ94 – by more than 30 kilometers.

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The Bernardinelli-Bernstein Object, as it has come to be known, was first observed in November 2020. At that time, it was three billion kilometers from the Sun and soon attracted attention for its size. Some even confused it with a dwarf planet.

Pedro and Gathy didn’t use telescopes to detect it, they were discovered by analyzing archived images from the Dark Energy Survey, a mapping of the universe that studies dark energy, the concept of energy that is said to dominate the cosmos and is responsible for its expansion. Faster.

Bernardinelli-Bernstein: Megacomet

Following recent Hubble observations, the scientific community has confirmed that Bernardinelli-Bernstein is a mega-comet and not a dwarf planet. Its nucleus is about 50 times larger than “ordinary” comets, with an estimated mass of 500 trillion tons, 100,000 times the size of the best-known ones.

The biggest difficulties in analyzing the object were the distance to it and the “mane” of dust around it. Hubble was unable to identify its core because it was too far away and showed a burst of bright light in its direction.

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To solve this problem, Man-To Hui of the University of Macau developed a computer model that detected the mane and placed it on telescope images. Therefore, its brightness was subtracted to get the core.

The maximum approach of Bernardinelli-Berstein to the Sun will occur in 2031. The expectation in the scientific community is that as the comet gets closer and closer to our solar system, and its years “closer”, it will be possible to better determine the data. already collected about the comet and make studies of its composition even more accurate.

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Source: Technological innovation.