Scholz's Star

Scholz's Star is a very dim pair of stars located about 22 light-years from the Sun. It sits in the area of the sky called Monoceros, close to the middle of our galaxy. The star system was found in 2013 by an astronomer named Ralf-Dieter Scholz.

What makes Scholz's Star interesting is that scientists believe it passed close to our Solar System a long time ago—about 70,000 years ago. When it passed by, it went through a faraway part of our Solar System called the Oort cloud. This close pass by another star is rare and helps scientists learn more about how stars move and how they might affect our Solar System.

Characteristics

Scholz's Star is a pair of small, dim stars. The bigger one is a red dwarf, and the smaller one is likely a brown dwarf—a type of object that is not quite big enough to be a true star. They orbit each other about every four years at a distance similar to that between the Sun and the farthest planets.

This star system is very faint and was only discovered in 2013, even though it is relatively close to us. It is located 22 light-years from the Sun and is one of the closest star systems to us, but it is hard to see because it does not shine very brightly.

Solar System flyby

Estimates show that a distant star system called WISE 0720−0846 passed about 52,000 astronomical units from the Sun roughly 70,000 years ago. Most calculations suggest it moved through the area surrounding our solar system known as the Oort cloud. Even at its closest point, this system would have been too faint to see without special tools.

Research in 2018 suggested that this star’s passing might have affected the Oort cloud more than first thought. Stars like this pass through this distant area about every 100,000 years, but a very close approach like this happens only once every few million years. In the distant future, around 1.4 million years from now, another star named Gliese 710 will pass even closer to our Sun.

Naming

The star was first found to be close to us by an astronomer named Ralf-Dieter Scholz. He shared this discovery in November 2013. Because this star passed very close to our Solar System a long time ago, another scientist named Eric Mamajek and his team called it Scholz's Star when they wrote about its movement and path through space.