With Pluto Out, It's Time to Revisit the Planet X Theory

For the last two centuries, many scientists have speculated about the existence of Planet X. After Neptune was discovered in the 19th Century, discrepancies in orbit had suggested that another planet in our Solar System existed.

It was Percival Lowell who called this undiscovered planet, "Planet X". Lowell performed two searches of this hypothetical planet between 1909 and 1915. He later used mathematical hypothesis of this so-called planet. It was during the last search that images of a planet surfaced that was later named Pluto.

Lowell died in 1916, and Pluto was indeed discovered through Lowell Observatory by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930. However, the mass of the planet was too small to explain the orbit around Neptune, and so the search for Planet X continued. Neptune has an unexplained gravitational pull, and that is why many scientists believe that a planet exists beyond Pluto.

The Planet X theory began to heat up again in the early 1990's when the first Neptune objects had been discovered beyond Pluto. It was in in 1992 that (15760) 1992 QB1 was discovered at an observatory in Hawaii. It is now classified as a cubewano and belongs to the Kuiper Belt. It is not controlled by orbit, and was officially eliminated from being considered a planet. A few more cubewanoes have been discovered since that time, but Planet X is still being searched for.

In the early 1990's, the United States Naval Observatory confirmed that an orbital perturbation on Uranus and Neptune is caused by one single, undiscovered planet. Plus, the new planet should be two to five times the size of Earth. Furthermore, the U.S. Naval Observatory also suggests that this new planet has a highly elliptical orbit and could be as far as five billion miles beyond Pluto.

According to 6,000-year old Sumerian descriptions, there is indeed a tenth planet in our solar system. Sumerians called this planet, Nibiru, which means "Planet of the Crossing". It begs that question if Sumerians had discovered the planet some 6,000 years ago, then why haven't we done so in recent times? That is why the Sumerian descriptions are now being confirmed in their language with the advancement in scientific technology.

Planet X has also been mistaken for the newly discovered objects -- Quaoar, Sedna, and Eris. They were all deemed too small by definition, and thus the they were not given the classification as planets. All three of the objects are now referred to as dwarf planets.

Another alternative theory exists according to John Murray of Open University and John Matese of Louisiana-Lafayette. They suggest that long period comets originate from regions in the sky rather than the proposed theory that Jan Oort used many years before that suggested they are coming from random directions. Therefore, those comets would be controlled by an unseen object that is likely to be as large as Jupiter.

Ironically, many of the scientists describe Planet X in nearly the exact similarity of the Sumerians. The Sumerians described Nibiru as the 12th planet in their description(Luna was a planet in their descriptions). There are diagrams in Sumerian language that show Nibiru as Planet X, and the amazing coincidence that links to what some scientists have believed all along.

The discovery of Pluto only happened in 1930 by telescope. Astronomers and scientists, with the advanced technology, should be able to discover if Planet X truly exists. Many objects over the years have been called Planet X, but none have proven to be Nibiru that was mentioned in the Sumerian writings. Most scientists agree that an unexplained gravitational pull on Neptune and Uranus is caused by a large object in space. Whether or not it is a planet, brown dwarf, or something else is not entirely known as of now.

So is there a planet that exists called Planet X or Nibiru, that the Sumarians described? Will our advanced technology in the next few years be able to uncover the mystery of this so-called planet? If one exists, how far out is it, and what controls its gravitational pull? Many efforts have been made to find Planet X, and most of the objects that have called by that name have been nothing more than dwarf planets. As we continue to explore more and more into space, we may finally found out the truth. But until then, Planet X is a hypothetical planet that has many of us wondering whether it truly exists or not. Whoever the first person is that discovers the would-be planet will be given numerous accolades for doing so, that is for sure.