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21h ago

TESS Observations Confirm Early Cometary Activity of 3I/ATLAS as Juno Intercept Proposal Gains Attention

Archival TESS imaging deepens support for a natural origin despite Avi Loeb’s unreviewed proposal to repurpose Juno for a flyby.

Avi Loeb, an astrophysicist at Harvard University, is pictured in 2022.
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Overview

  • New TESS precovery photometry from May–June 2025 shows 3I/ATLAS maintained a coma at about 6.4 AU from the Sun, indicating early outgassing well before its July discovery.
  • In a yet-to-be-peer-reviewed paper, Avi Loeb calculates that a September thruster burn could redirect NASA’s Juno probe for a close flyby of 3I/ATLAS by mid-March 2026.
  • Chris Lintott and other astronomers continue to characterize the object as a typical icy comet based on its coma, tail and refined hyperbolic trajectory.
  • NASA reaffirms that 3I/ATLAS poses no risk to Earth as it speeds through the inner Solar System at roughly 60 kilometers per second.
  • As the third known interstellar visitor, 3I/ATLAS is drawing observations from facilities including the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, Hubble and the James Webb Space Telescope ahead of its October perihelion inside Mars’s orbit.