Illustration of the orbit of a Centaur asteroid 4.5 billion years ago, relative to the protoplanetary disc. The asteroid orbits around the sun far from the disc in a plane perpendicular to it. © Protoplanetary disc: NASA
Ka`epaoka`awela asteroid 1 surprised the world in 2018: it was the first object in the solar system that was demonstrated to be of extrasolar origin. But now those who discovered it have announced that it is not alone. Published in MNRAS on 23 April 2020, work by Fathi Namouni, a CNRS researcher in the Laboratoire Lagrange (CNRS/Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur/Université Côte d’Azur), and Helena Morais, researcher at UNESP in Brazil, proves that at least 19 other asteroids orbited another star before joining our system.
