Astronomers have found the atmosphere of an ultra-small icy body in the Solar system

For the first time, astronomers have discovered a thin atmosphere in a miniature celestial body at the edge of the Solar System, which was previously considered too small to hold a gaseous envelope. This was reported by the journal Nature Astronomy.

The discovery was made by a group of researchers led by Ko Arimatsu, associate professor at the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan. We are talking about a trans-Neptunian object called (612533) 2002 XV93, located in the Kuiper Belt. Its diameter is about 500 km, which is almost five times smaller than the size of Pluto, the largest TNO with a thin atmosphere.

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