Well this is certainly something.
To try and tl;dr it - they've been observing a number of Kuiper belt objects, and found that at least six of them showed eccentricities in their orbit consistent with being gravitationally influenced. However, these objects are too far out to have been affected by Neptune. It's also unlikely that their orbits were independently perturbed - for all six to have developed their orbits as is without something like the hypothesized planet is something like .007%.
As for how far out it is... well, Voyager's about 135 AU (1 AU being the average distance of the earth from the sun for those unfamiliar) At its closest point to the sun (its perihelion), the proposed planet would be around 200 AU away. At it's furthest (its aphelion)? Potentially as much as 1200 AU, averaging out at around 600 AU over the total course of its orbit.
Previous attempts to find gas giants in the outer system have ruled out anything Saturn-sized or above within 10,000 AU, but at about Neptune-sized, this potential planet might have been missed.
This day in Space History
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Re: This day in Space History
Yes, I have heard about that.
Right now, scientists believe there is a planet about the size of Neptune somewhere in the scattered disc, with an orbit similar in shape to Sedna, but oriented roughly in the opposite direction.
It's kinda going to be difficult to find. But at least they have a general idea of where to look.
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22 years ago today, Clementine, the Deep Space Program Science Experiment, was launched atop a Titan 23G rocket from Pad 4W, Vandenberg AFB.
The probe was sent on a brief survey of the Moon, with the intent to send it into solar orbit afterward to get at least one fly-by of an asteroid. This is the spacecraft that was first to find water ice in permanently-shaded portions of polar craters on the Moon.
Once its lunar mission was over, it was directed back to a highly-elliptical Earth orbit to eventually build enough momentum to enter solar orbit and encounter the asteroid 1620 Geographos. However, shortly after TEI (trans-Earth injection; I adopted an Apollo-era term to describe it), its guidance computer malfunctioned, and the probe used up all its attitude control fuel on an eleven-minute-long burn that spun Clementine up to 80 RPM.
Unable to train its solar panels on the Sun, it soon ran out of power and failed. It is currently derelict in an orbit with a perigee of about 500 miles, and an apogee of about 250,000 miles.
Right now, scientists believe there is a planet about the size of Neptune somewhere in the scattered disc, with an orbit similar in shape to Sedna, but oriented roughly in the opposite direction.
It's kinda going to be difficult to find. But at least they have a general idea of where to look.
********
22 years ago today, Clementine, the Deep Space Program Science Experiment, was launched atop a Titan 23G rocket from Pad 4W, Vandenberg AFB.
The probe was sent on a brief survey of the Moon, with the intent to send it into solar orbit afterward to get at least one fly-by of an asteroid. This is the spacecraft that was first to find water ice in permanently-shaded portions of polar craters on the Moon.
Once its lunar mission was over, it was directed back to a highly-elliptical Earth orbit to eventually build enough momentum to enter solar orbit and encounter the asteroid 1620 Geographos. However, shortly after TEI (trans-Earth injection; I adopted an Apollo-era term to describe it), its guidance computer malfunctioned, and the probe used up all its attitude control fuel on an eleven-minute-long burn that spun Clementine up to 80 RPM.
Unable to train its solar panels on the Sun, it soon ran out of power and failed. It is currently derelict in an orbit with a perigee of about 500 miles, and an apogee of about 250,000 miles.
Re: This day in Space History
33 years ago today, the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS) was launched atop a Delta 3910 rocket from Pad 4W, Vandenberg AFB.
It was essentially a high-resolution telescope with a large liquid helium tank. Launched into a noon-midnight sun-synchronous polar orbit so it would always pass behind Earth, it used evaporative cooling to keep its infrared sensors at a mere 2 K (-271 °C). Using that, it did an infrared survey of the entire night sky.
It discovered three asteroids and six comets, and discovered some things in the distant universe that confused scientists to the point they thought they found a giant rogue planet near our solar system. (It turned out to be a newly-discovered distant phenomenon.)
The mission lasted 10 months, pinpointing over 250,000 infrared sources, until it ran out of helium to keep it cool.
Re: This day in Space History
55 years ago today, the Soviet Union launched Tyazhely Sputnik ("Heavy Satellite"; the West referred to it as Sputnik 7) on an R-7 Molniya rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome.
This satellite was supposed to be sent to Venus. However, after it made it to Earth orbit, the valves on the fourth stage of the rocket failed to close. As a result, liquid oxygen pumped into the engine chamber prematurely, and it exploded upon ignition.
The Soviet Union still hailed the achievement; at about 6,500 kg between probe and fourth stage, it was the largest object orbited thus far.
The Soviets hoped the satellite would burn up over the Pacific, but it didn't. A medal that was supposed to survive impact on Venus was discovered in a river in Siberia. It eventually made its way back to Sergei Korolev, who gave it to one of his associates at the OKB-1 design bureau, Boris Chertok.
This satellite was supposed to be sent to Venus. However, after it made it to Earth orbit, the valves on the fourth stage of the rocket failed to close. As a result, liquid oxygen pumped into the engine chamber prematurely, and it exploded upon ignition.
The Soviet Union still hailed the achievement; at about 6,500 kg between probe and fourth stage, it was the largest object orbited thus far.
The Soviets hoped the satellite would burn up over the Pacific, but it didn't. A medal that was supposed to survive impact on Venus was discovered in a river in Siberia. It eventually made its way back to Sergei Korolev, who gave it to one of his associates at the OKB-1 design bureau, Boris Chertok.
Re: This day in Space History
42 years ago today, with the landing of Skylab 4, the Skylab Rescue mission was officially stood down. The Saturn IB rocket (SA-209) and specially-fitted five-seat Apollo Command/Service Module (CSM-119) were rolled back from Pad 39B to the Vehicle Assembly Building.
After leaks developed in two RCS thruster quads for the CSM for Skylab 3, Skylab Rescue was rolled out for a potential rescue mission. For that mission, CSM-119 was rolled out on SA-208. If needed, Skylab Rescue would've been flown by commander Vance Brand (left) and CM pilot Don Lind.
(Notice how they modified the Skylab model to remove a solar panel and add the two makeshift sunshades.)
Eventually, training by Brand and Lind, who were also the backup crew for Skylab 3 along with mission scientist Dr. William Lenoir, figured out that the CSM could safely re-enter with only two of the CSM's four thruster quads.
When Skylab 3 landed, Skylab Rescue was rolled back to the VAB, and CSM-119 was moved to SA-209, while SA-208 was used to launch Skylab 4.
CSM-119 and AS-209 were also considered for use in a possible 20-day "Skylab 5" mission which would've utilized the remaining spare supplies on Skylab, and prepped it either for potential future visits by the Space Shuttle, or to lower its orbit to hasten its decay. They would ultimately be used as a backup for Apollo-Soyuz in 1975.
SA-209 is the Saturn IB display in the Rocket Garden of the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, connected to an Apollo CSM test article boilerplate. CSM-119 is at the Apollo/Saturn V Center there.
Brand would be CM pilot for Apollo-Soyuz, and would go on to command three Space Shuttle missions. (He would also almost become America's first in-flight fatality.) Lind wouldn't get to fly until 1985.
After leaks developed in two RCS thruster quads for the CSM for Skylab 3, Skylab Rescue was rolled out for a potential rescue mission. For that mission, CSM-119 was rolled out on SA-208. If needed, Skylab Rescue would've been flown by commander Vance Brand (left) and CM pilot Don Lind.
(Notice how they modified the Skylab model to remove a solar panel and add the two makeshift sunshades.)
Eventually, training by Brand and Lind, who were also the backup crew for Skylab 3 along with mission scientist Dr. William Lenoir, figured out that the CSM could safely re-enter with only two of the CSM's four thruster quads.
When Skylab 3 landed, Skylab Rescue was rolled back to the VAB, and CSM-119 was moved to SA-209, while SA-208 was used to launch Skylab 4.
CSM-119 and AS-209 were also considered for use in a possible 20-day "Skylab 5" mission which would've utilized the remaining spare supplies on Skylab, and prepped it either for potential future visits by the Space Shuttle, or to lower its orbit to hasten its decay. They would ultimately be used as a backup for Apollo-Soyuz in 1975.
SA-209 is the Saturn IB display in the Rocket Garden of the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, connected to an Apollo CSM test article boilerplate. CSM-119 is at the Apollo/Saturn V Center there.
Brand would be CM pilot for Apollo-Soyuz, and would go on to command three Space Shuttle missions. (He would also almost become America's first in-flight fatality.) Lind wouldn't get to fly until 1985.
Re: This day in Space History
15 years ago today, the NEAR Shoemaker mission was supposed to end when the probe was ordered to crash on asteroid 433 Eros.
The Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous probe was launched on February 17, 1996. It flew by asteroid 253 Mathilde 17 months later, then was sent to a fly-by of Earth. The really-close fly-by (540 km) raised its orbital inclination to 10.2° above the Ecliptic plane of the Solar System, and lined its orbit up with great precision to that of asteroid 433 Eros.
Its first attempt to enter orbit around Eros, on December 20, 1998, was nearly disastrous, but they were able to recover for a second successful attempt on February 14, 2000. They spent nearly a year around Eros, studying the structure and composition of the asteroid, and taking enough pictures to completely map it.
At the end of the mission, NEAR was commanded to land on Eros in Himeros crater. It was not intended to survive the landing, but Eros's gravity was slight enough that it did. It would last an additional two weeks before it finally failed, likely placed eventually in shadow from the Sun and eventually frozen out. During the landed phase, they used the probe's gamma ray spectrometer on the asteroid at point-blank range.
The original plan for the NEAR mission was to orbit asteroid 4660 Nereus by way of 2019 Van Albada. It would have then departed Nereus to seek other asteroids and comets, including Eros, and even 4 Vesta (recently visited by Dawn). But as time went on, Eros became the ultimate destination. If there were plans to go beyond Eros, they were likely thwarted by the incident in 1998.
After its launch, NEAR was christened NEAR Shoemaker in honor of astronomer Eugene Shoemaker, a prominent researcher in near-Earth asteroids who is best known for finding Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, the comet that struck Jupiter in 1994.
Re: This day in Space History
Happy 80th birthday to NASA astronaut Jack Lousma. He is the only astronaut with a birthday on February 29.
After getting a degree in aeronautical engineering from Michigan in 1959, he became a Marine Corps aviator. After serving out of Okinawa, he would get his masters from the Naval Postgraduate School in 1965. The next year, he was selected to NASA as part of the "Original 19" group.
He was the CM pilot for the second Skylab flight, with commander Alan Bean and scientist astronaut Dr. Owen Garriott. He then commanded Columbia on STS-3 with pilot Gordon Fullerton. He was allegedly scheduled to be LM pilot for Apollo 20 before the extra Apollo missions were canceled, which would've made him the 18th man to walk on the Moon.
He was also a CAPCOM for three Apollo flights, and received the infamous "Houston, we've had a problem" call from Jim Lovell in Apollo 13.
Re: This day in Space History
56 years ago today, NASA launched Pioneer 5 on a Thor-Able rocket from Pad 17A, Cape Canaveral.
The most ambitious satellite of the early Pioneer program, it was launched into heliocentric orbit for the purpose of testing interplanetary communications. They were able to discern data from about 10 million miles, and merely detect its signal from 22 million miles.
The path of the probe simulated a trajectory to Venus, but the probe itself was not designed to go there, nor was it launched at an appropriate window to get there.
Re: This day in Space History
Have I really not updated this in two months?! 
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52 years ago today, the first in-flight test of the Apollo escape tower was conducted with A-001, a Little Joe II rocket launch, from Pad 36, White Sands Missile Range.
During the planned abort, there was recontact between the Little Joe II rocket and the Command Module boilerplate, BP-12, causing minor damage to the heat shield area. One of the three main parachutes was sheared off when the connecting lines were cut by their deployment bay on BP-12. As the third parachute was a redundancy, the CM only descended very slightly faster than predicted (7.9 m/s, compared to the prediction of 7.2 m/s).
Other than those two anomalies, the objectives were carried out to NASA's satisfaction. There would be three further tests. A-001 reached an apogee of 9 km, and landed 6.8 km downrange.
The Little Joe II rocket had six Thiokol Recruit boosters, and one Aerojet Algol sustainer rocket. The Recruit boosters each only lasted 1.5 seconds, and were fired in series, while the Algol lasted 40 seconds to continue thrust to the desired altitude. It had an initial force of 314,000 pounds of thrust.
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52 years ago today, the first in-flight test of the Apollo escape tower was conducted with A-001, a Little Joe II rocket launch, from Pad 36, White Sands Missile Range.
During the planned abort, there was recontact between the Little Joe II rocket and the Command Module boilerplate, BP-12, causing minor damage to the heat shield area. One of the three main parachutes was sheared off when the connecting lines were cut by their deployment bay on BP-12. As the third parachute was a redundancy, the CM only descended very slightly faster than predicted (7.9 m/s, compared to the prediction of 7.2 m/s).
Other than those two anomalies, the objectives were carried out to NASA's satisfaction. There would be three further tests. A-001 reached an apogee of 9 km, and landed 6.8 km downrange.
The Little Joe II rocket had six Thiokol Recruit boosters, and one Aerojet Algol sustainer rocket. The Recruit boosters each only lasted 1.5 seconds, and were fired in series, while the Algol lasted 40 seconds to continue thrust to the desired altitude. It had an initial force of 314,000 pounds of thrust.
Re: This day in Space History
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUXuV7XbZvUSince early in my term, our efforts in space have been under review.
With the advice of the Vice President, who is Chairman of the National Space Council, we have examined where we are strong and where we are not, where we may succeed and where we may not.
Now it is time to take longer strides—time for a great new American enterprise—time for this nation to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on earth.
I believe we possess all the resources and talents necessary. But the facts of the matter are that we have never made the national decisions or marshaled the national resources required for such leadership. We have never specified long-range goals on an urgent time schedule, or managed our resources and our time so as to ensure their fulfillment.
Recognizing the head start obtained by the Soviets with their large rocket engines, which gives them many months of lead-time, and recognizing the likelihood that they will exploit this lead for some time to come in still more impressive successes, we nevertheless are required to make new efforts on our own. For while we cannot guarantee that we shall one day be first, we can guarantee that any failure to make this effort will make us last.
We take an additional risk by making it in full view of the world, but as shown by the feat of astronaut Shepard, this very risk enhances our stature when we are successful. But this is not merely a race. Space is open to us now; and our eagerness to share its meaning is not governed by the efforts of others. We go into space because whatever mankind must undertake, free men must fully share.
I therefore ask the Congress, above and beyond the increases I have earlier requested for space activities, to provide the funds which are needed to meet the following national goals:
First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth.
No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.
We propose to accelerate the development of the appropriate lunar space craft. We propose to develop alternate liquid and solid fuel boosters, much larger than any now being developed, until certain which is superior. We propose additional funds for other engine development and for unmanned explorations—explorations which are particularly important for one purpose which this nation will never overlook: the survival of the man who first makes this daring flight.
But in a very real sense, it will not be one man going to the moon—if we make this judgment affirmatively, it will be an entire nation. For all of us must work to put him there.