Quaoar: Large Asteroid in the Outer Solar System

Explanation: Asteroids almost as large as planets are still being discovered in our own Solar System . Recently an asteroid more than half the size of Pluto was found orbiting at a distance only a little further than the Solar System's most distant planet . The large asteroid moves relative to background stars in the discovery images shown above taken by the Oschin Telescope at Palomar , California , USA . Quaoar, the name suggested for the space rock by its discoverers, is one of several large asteroids discovered recently that roam in the distant Kuiper Belt . Quaoar's size was resolved by images from the Hubble Space Telescope . Quaoar is likely a cold world covered in ice from which the Sun appears only as a particularly bright star.