As you read this, it is possible that several objects from other solar systems are passing through the solar system, undetected by us. Only on three occasions have we managed to see one —ʻOumuamua, Borisov and 3I/ATLAS—. But the scientific estimatesYoStatistics say that for every traveler observed, thousands remain invisible.
Since the Pan-STARRS telescope detected ʻOumuamua, the first confirmed interstellar body, the astreitherWe don’t know that these visitors exist. Borisov, in 2019, confirmedeither that it was not a coincidence; and 3I/ATLAS, in 2024, sumeither a third confirmationeithern with characterYostatic toornmtos mysterious (like their “anti-cola”). But three detections in dandfalls do not imply scarcity, but rather limitations in our ability to see them.
A study by astronomers Do, Tucker and Tonry estimated that for every interstellar object like Oumuamua that we detect, couldYothere are between 10,000 and one million mtos crossing our confines and going unnoticed. They suggest that, at any moment, you canYoto be a thousand interstellar objects within the eitherNeptune’s orbit that we haven’t even recorded.
The surprising thing: The actual passing rate could be one to ten objects the size of Oumuamua by añeitherbut our telescopes would only discover a very small fraction of them.
The reasons why these travelers go unnoticed are physical and technological. For example, many of them do not develop visible tails or comas, like classical comets. Also It is possible that they reflect little light, that they move at very high speeds (almost double that of 3I/ATLAS) or that our search programs tend to favor regular orbits or elliptical, leaving aside fast hyperbolic trajectories.
That is why these objects are like silent comets crossing the night, difficult to distinguish except in rare moments. The arrival of the Rubin Observatory and its great LSST project will mark a before and after. Designed to map the entire sky every few days, It is expected to increase the detection rate of objects similar to Oumuamua by 100, even those with d brightness.andbil or radical trajectories.
We will also have new algorithms to recognize hyperbolic trajectories in real timepreventing these visitors from going unnoticed by classic filters. What seemed random could become routine.
Each interstellar traveler is a living (or inert) capsule of another system: a chemical sample built around another star. Studying them could reveal how planets are born, what materials are abundant in other orbits, and whether it is possible for life to travel between systems.
But perhaps the most exciting thing is the lesson: The unknown is not still, it passes quickly through us. And even if we only glimpse a few, the entire universe is a corridor full of silent visitors.