Hubble telescope captures third interstellar visitor 3I/ATLAS showing active dust coma racing through solar system.

No one knows where the comet came from. It’s like glimpsing a rifle bullet for a thousandth of a second,” said David Jewitt, the University of California, Los Angeles astronomer in charge of Hubble’s newest observations.

Comet 3I/ATLAS has been observed by the Hubble Space Telescope, which delivered new insights into this third interstellar visitor. The orbital observatory has refined the estimates about the size of the cometary nucleus and confirmed that the comet is the fastest ever to come from beyond the Solar System.

U-M astronomers are helping study a fast-moving, ancient, and massive comet that formed beyond our galaxy. A group of astronomers from around the world, including a doctoral student from the University of Michigan,

Astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope have observed 3I/ATLAS, only the third known object from outside our Solar System to visit our neighborhood.