Follow your curiosity

What discovery has been shared with you?

FACTREE gives you something interesting to discover every day — and something worth talking about together.

Start with one fact. Explore it, go deeper, then follow whichever branch catches your imagination.

Choose subjects for a surprise

Exploring any topic

Begin your discovery

Your next discovery is one click away.

Choose one or more subjects above, or leave Any Topic selected and let curiosity decide.

Astronomy

Detecting Interstellar Objects Passing Through the Solar System

Quick fact

In October 2017, the Pan-STARRS1 telescope in Hawaii detected 'Oumuamua, the first known interstellar object, as a faint point of light moving against the background stars. It was already speeding past Earth and out of the solar system, and astronomers had only a few weeks to observe it before it disappeared forever.

Why this is interesting

Imagine a rock from another star system zipping through our cosmic neighborhood at 200,000 mph—how could we ever catch a glimpse of it? In 2017, we did exactly that.