Facts about the Kuiper Belt
- 08
Haumea, a dwarf planet in the Kuiper Belt, rotates so rapidly it completes one spin every 3.9 hours, making it the fastest-spinning large body in the solar system.
- 07
Comets originating from the Kuiper Belt have orbital periods ranging from 20 to 200 years, making them short-period comets that frequently return to the inner solar system.
- 06
Makemake, the second-brightest dwarf planet in the Kuiper Belt, orbits the Sun once every 310 Earth years at a distance of 46 astronomical units.
- 05
In 2005, astronomers discovered Eris in the Kuiper Belt, a dwarf planet so distant it takes 557 Earth years to complete one orbit around the Sun.
- 04
Scattered beyond the Kuiper Belt lies the Oort Cloud, a theoretical spherical shell of icy bodies extending up to 100,000 astronomical units from the Sun.
- 03
Approximately 30,000 to 55,000 objects larger than 100 kilometers in diameter exist in the Kuiper Belt, with the largest known being Eris, which exceeds Pluto's mass by 27 percent.
- 02
Over 200,000 icy bodies larger than 100 kilometers across populate the Kuiper Belt, with millions more smaller objects orbiting beyond Neptune's path.
- 01
Pluto, discovered in 1930, was reclassified as a dwarf planet in 2006 because thousands of similar icy bodies populate the Kuiper Belt beyond Neptune.