What is the Kuiper Belt object Arrokoth?
Quick Answer
Arrokoth is a small, icy Kuiper Belt object visited by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft in 2019. It is one of the most primitive and distant worlds ever explored up close.
The Full Story
Arrokoth is a Kuiper Belt object located beyond Neptune, far from the Sun in the outer solar system. NASA’s New Horizons flew past it on 1 January 2019, making it the most distant object ever visited by a spacecraft at the time. Arrokoth is notable for its unusual shape, which resembles two connected lobes, and for preserving clues about how small bodies formed in the early solar system. In 2020, it was officially named Arrokoth, a word from the Powhatan language meaning “sky.”
Key Facts
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"The snowman-shaped world at the edge of the solar system"
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