Astronomers have announced that they have "real evidence" that another planet in our solar system exists, dubbing it the ninth planet located in the edges of our solar system.
"Planet X" is a supposed gas giant which is comparable to the size of Neptune where its orbital path lies billions of miles from Neptune, which can take 10,000 to 20,000 years to complete its one orbit around the sun.
Researchers from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) is calling their discovery Planet 9 however, there is one slight dilemma, they have not even seen it yet. This discovery is based on their findings from data based on computer models, where Planet 9 is estimated reveal itself within five years or less, becoming visible via telescope.
According to astronomer Mike Brown of Caltech, the reason why this discovery was announced before direct observations of this planet so that people could help us find Planet 9, instead of staying quiet, spending the next few years searching the skies, hoping to find it.
Once this Planet 9 is detected, Brown says that there will be no Pluto planetary debate, as Brown was the one who removed Pluto's planetary status back in 2006, now officially making it a dwarf planet.
According to co-author of the study, planetary scientist, Konstantin Batygin of Caltech, this is the first time in 150 years that there is good evidence that the planetary census for our solar system is apparently incomplete, as Neptune is considered as Planet 8.
Their prediction is based on six objects located in the icy Kuiper Belt, which is a major asteroid belt containing millions of comets and icy objects beyond Neptune, where these objects appear to be influenced by a real planet. One of the six icy objects called Sedna, which is a minor planet, was also discovered by Brown, more than a decade ago, which is located in the fringes of the solar system.
Batygin reveals that this prediction is also based on a gravitational signature emitted by Planet 9 that is lurking in the solar system's frontier, although they have not yet found the object itself.
Planet 9 is estimated to be 20 to 100 billion miles from Earth, possessing an egg shaped orbit, where a space telescope is needed for direct observational evidence. This planet is estimated to be 10 times bigger than Earth and 5,000 times more massive than Pluto, that could also possess rings and moons.
NASA's New Horizons spacecraft recently conducted a flyby of Pluto, obtaining high resolution photos of the dwarf planet, however it did not capture photos of Planet en route to Pluto since it was in the opposite direction of Planet 9.
According to principal investigator for NASA's New Horizons, Alan Stern, every few years there are many predictions about a new planet, hidden in the solar system, however, we have to wait and see about this, as prediction is not discovery.
This new study is published in the Astronomical Journal.