NASA Finds Alien Dust From Interstellar Space Speeding Through Our Solar System

Washington DC: National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) scientists have discovered particles of alien dust floating in our solar system. The cosmic substance was discovered by the Cassini spacecraft, which has been orbiting Saturn since 2004.

The strange dust moves in different directions at high speed, which is unlike the dust found on the red planet, suggesting it came from deep space. The microscopic dust particles were moving at a rate of 45,000 mph, a speed so fast that the dust can essentially avoid being trapped by the gravitational force of Sun.

Cassini has been using its cosmic dust analyzer to sample millions of ice-rich dust grains and discovered something incredible. A total of 36 of these particles had the mysterious qualities which led scientists to conclude the dust came from outside our solar system. They said they came from interstellar space - the void that exists between stars. When they were analyzed, it was revealed the dust grains were made of minerals.

Most of it came from Saturn’s active moon, Enceladus, which has a global ocean and other geographic features, as well as jets which spray dust particles into space. Enceladus is the sixth largest moon of Saturn. The planet has a total of 62 moons of varying sizes, the second highest number of moons for a planet in our solar system after Jupiter, which has 67 moons.

Information about the makeup of interstellar dust can help scientists understand more about how the universe was created. Cosmic dust is produced when stars die.

Nicolas Altobelli, Cassini project scientist at the European Space Agency and lead author of the study said the particles had been discovered before, and the team had been hopeful to locate them near Saturn. He said: “From that discovery, we always hoped we would be able to detect these interstellar interlopers at Saturn with Cassini. We knew that if we looked in the right direction, we should find them.”