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The NASA discovery, Ultima Thule, might have a competition for most distant object in the Solar System. Pictured: In this handout provided by NASA, New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), Boulder, CO, speaks during an overview of the New Horizons Mission, Monday, December 31, 2018 at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. Joel Kowsky/NASA via Getty Images

Astronomers from the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington have discovered what could be the most distant object in our solar system, potentially beating out the recently discovered Ultima Thule which was captured by NASA’s New Horizons probe.

According to a report, Astronomer Scott Sheppard discovered a faint object during one of his search for the supposed “ninth giant planet.” The object was spotted at a distance that is 140 times farther from the sun compared to Earth, or 3.5 times farther than Pluto.

The object is tentatively considered the farthest object from our solar system and is named “FarFarOut.” The name was coined from Sheppard’s earlier space object discovery called “FarOut” which is located 120 times farther to the sun from Earth.

Sheppard’s discovery could beat out Ultima Thule, the farthest object explored by NASA’s New Horizons space aircraft. Ultima Thule, also known as Kuiper Belt object 2014 MU69, was discovered during New Year’s Day of 2019. It was spotted 6.6 billion kilometers from Earth and was then considered as the most distant object found by a spacecraft. According to NASA scientists, the space object can help provide information on how the early solar system was formed.

Sheppard and his team which includes Chad Trujillo at Northern Arizona University and Dave Tholen at the University of Hawaii, constantly searches space for distant objects that could help them pinpoint the orbit for Planet Nine.

To do this, Sheppard used some of the world’s best and most powerful telescopes like the Blanco 4-meter in Chile and the Subaru 8-meter in Hawaii. The team’s constant search resulted in numerous objects located beyond 9 billion kilometers from the sun. Aside from FarFarOut and FarOut, the team has also discovered “the Goblin.”

On the other hand, NASA’s New Horizons probe was launched in 2006 and has been exploring the solar system ever since. The spacecraft was able to gather data from Jupiter and also spent six months probing Pluto and its moons back in 2015. New Horizons has been able to examine the space beyond Neptune.

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