Meteor fragments from an 'interstellar space rock' are being hunted in the Pacific Ocean, just north of Papua New Guinea, according to reports.
This comes as a Harvard professor, along with his team of university students, claimed to have found the fragments believed to have originated outside our Solar System. If proven, this will be the first time that an alien space object entered Earth.
The controversial claim involves an apparent interstellar meteor fragment from an unusual meteorite called "IM1" which exploded over the Pacific Ocean back in January 2014.
After several years, the Harvard team had been hunting the "alien meteor." However, their findings have not been published yet due to challenges surrounding the nature and accuracy of their claim, the reports said.
Although a U.S. government agency confirmed certain details of the IM1 meteorite, other scientists are still not convinced that the celestial object came from space beyond our Solar System. The skepticism comes from the fact that no space rocks or their fragments originated outside our cosmic neighborhood. Most of these Earthly visitors came from Asteroid Belt orbiting between Mars and Jupiter.
The farthest known record of a space rock hitting our planet was the dinosaur-killing imposter that struck Earth 66 million years ago. Scientists believed it came from the Oord cloud, a region in space located at the edge of our solar system consisting of a large number of comets. In addition, the asteroid Oumuamua is so far the only interstellar object confirmed to be passing our Solar System.
Interstellar Space Rock
A stock photo of the ocean. Recent reports indicate researchers found interstellar meteor fragments at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.
Based on a June 21 blog report by Avi Loeb, the Harvard professor who spearheaded IM1's findings, further fragments of the 'interstellar meteor' are being searched on its crash site in the Pacific Ocean to retrieve as much as metallic pearl-looking spherules. The research team is planning to analyze them upon return, also to determine the fragments' material properties.
Loeb also mentioned on his blog that before he left Harvard University, one of his colleagues told him that many people said he is wasting time in "leading a hopeless expedition" to the Pacific Ocean. Yet, the Harvard professor also agreed that there is a small chance of success behind the whole quest to prove that the meteor fragments are interstellar in origin.
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U.S. Government Data
According to a BBC report earlier this week, the only recorded evidence of IM1's existence came from the U.S. government. This is under the context that Loeb's work surrounding the unconfirmed interstellar meteor fragments have been criticized for years.
Earlier this year, NASA received a letter signed by the U.S. Space Force Lieutenant General, accompanied by a blue seal from the U.S. Department of Defense, confirming the accuracy of Loeb's findings that would suggest the unusual meteor came from interstellar space, as cited by the BBC.
Despite the U.S. government confirming the details about IM1, NASA scientists are still unconvinced that the space rock originated from another Solar System or a different part of space outside our cosmic neighborhood, The New York Times reported.
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