Hubble finds mysterious object SCP 06F6
An international team of astronomers has found an object in deep space, which they call SCP 06F6, using the Hubble Space Telescope during a Cluster Supernova Survey. Unfortunately, the object doesn’t match up to any known astronomical body ever classified before.
The SCP in SCP 06F6 stands for “Supernova Cosmology Project.” In this case, SCP 06F6 is called by its discoverers as an “unusual optical transient.”
They write about it in their paper “Discovery of an unusual optical transient with the Hubble Space Telescope” (pdf file). It will eventually appear in The Astrophysical Journal (being accepted on September 8, 2008). The lead author of the research is American astrophysicist Kyle Barbary, from the Department of Physics at the University of California at Berkeley.
