For years, scientists all over the world are studying comets, learning how they form and where they came from. The latest discovery made by Europe's spacecraft "Rosetta" is that comets do have sinkholes.
NDTV reported that the comet, known as "67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenk" had sinkholes. The sinkholes are so massive that they can rival the Great Pyramids of Giza. It has a diameter of 656 feet with a depth of 590 feet.
Astronomer Dennis Bodewits, from the University of Maryland, said, "These strange, circular pits are just as deep as they are wide."
Bodewits also told Gizmodo Australia, "Rosetta can peer right into them."
The latest discovery is actually going to help scientists learn more about comets, especially how comets are formed and evolved.
Wired reported that scientists are finding new things inside the pits. Jean-Baptiste Vincent, a scientist from Max Planck Institute said, "In the walls of these pits, there are strange things, though we don't fully understand what they are."
Vincent added that he and his fellow scientist are seeing a lot of fractures and what appeared to be pebbles in the comet. Some refer to those "pebbles" as "dinosaur eggs" or "dino eggs."
The sinkholes are unexpected features. It was not Rosetta's mission to find sinkholes in the comet that it has been orbiting. But once the sinkholes appeared, scientists found them hard to ignore.
Vincent added that it is very intriguing because it is their first time to encounter sinkholes in a comet.
Paul Weissman, a senior scientist from NASA, said, "You can predict from known physics certain things, but the world is more complex than our knowledge of how to do the physics is right now."
Comets indeed are the way to unlock the mysteries of the universe, and as iconic as "Rosetta" may be, who shares its namesake with the famed stone that unlocked the secret of language, humanity may be closer to understanding more about the universe itself.
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