Only two spacecraft have ever truly escaped the solar system, slipping beyond the Sun’s protective bubble into interstellar space. Their measurements are now reshaping how I understand the heliosphere ...

This cosmic visitor is now officially named 3I/ATLAS, and it appears to be a comet from another solar system. Reading time 3 minutes Update: July 3, 09:24 a.m. ET: On Wednesday, July 2, the ...

Realising that our solar system isn’t like most others out there has helped astronomers rewrite the story of how it formed ...

Discovery: On July 2, 2025, astronomers confirmed Comet 3I/ATLAS, marking only the third interstellar object (ISO) ever detected passing through our Solar System, after 1I/ʻOumuamua (2017) and ...

Illustration comparing the planets of the Solar System and the Sun on the same scale. The planets are shown to scale relative to each other but their distances are not. From left to right the bodies ...