--- title: NASA New Horizons Spots Takes Photos of Kuiper Belt Object description: You can see the object 15 times closer than before canonical: https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-12-08T13:48:32.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:56:55.112Z article:section: Science og:title: NASA Spotted an Object 3.3 Billion Miles Away From the Sun og:description: And you can see the object 15 times closer than before og:url: https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5b78cd7842440a11/6988744b196cf443400395a6/new-horizons-kbo-photo-circle.jpg?branch=production&width=720&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 720 og:image:height: 405 og:image:alt: New Horizons Pluto og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: NASA Spotted an Object 3.3 Billion Miles Away From the Sun twitter:description: And you can see the object 15 times closer than before twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5b78cd7842440a11/6988744b196cf443400395a6/new-horizons-kbo-photo-circle.jpg?branch=production&width=720&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # NASA Spotted an Object 3.3 Billion Miles Away From the Sun > Sponsored content. 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It reaches 40,000 subscribers with a 34.2% open rate and a 2.1% click rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I follow the energy transition as a business story? Future Proof covers climate and energy as an economic and business story rather than only an environmental one. It publishes every Friday and is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who writes Future Proof? Justin Worland, a senior correspondent at TIME and an award-winning climate journalist, writes Future Proof. #### Is Future Proof free? Yes. Future Proof is free at time.com/newsletters. ## Video: Astronaut plays bagpipes in space [Watch (HLS stream): Astronaut plays bagpipes in space](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/DmP3AOis.m3u8) (1:09)  _Published 2015-11-08. U.S. Astronaut Kjell Lindgren played_ by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Dec 8, 2015 1:48 PM UTC  NASA's New Horizons spacecraft captured this image of the Kuiper Belt object 1994 JR1 on Nov. 2, 2015. NASA's New Horizons spacecraft captured this image of the Kuiper Belt object 1994 JR1 on Nov. 2, 2015. NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Dec 8, 2015 1:48 PM UTC NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft captured the closest-ever look at a small object in the solar system’s distant Kuiper Belt, the ring of icy bodies and asteroids beyond the orbit of Neptune. The New Horizons team, which performed the first ever flyby of Pluto this summer, took four photos of the object on Nov. 2\. That tiny dot in the photograph is a 90-mile-wide object called 1994 JR1, [as seen from 170 million miles away](http://www.space.com/31305-new-horizons-kuiper-belt-object-photos.html). That may sound like a lot, but it’s 15 times closer than any Kuiper Belt object has been photographed before. If NASA approves the extension of the New Horizons mission, we can expect even more glimpses of ancient objects at the edge of our solar system. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/"},"headline":"NASA Spotted an Object 3.3 Billion Miles Away From the Sun","datePublished":"2015-12-08T13:48:32.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:56:55.112Z","description":"And you can see the object 15 times closer than before","url":"https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/","keywords":["Space"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5b78cd7842440a11/6988744b196cf443400395a6/new-horizons-kbo-photo-circle.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"Science","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5b78cd7842440a11/6988744b196cf443400395a6/new-horizons-kbo-photo-circle.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"New Horizons Pluto","caption":"New Horizons Pluto","creditText":"NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/science/","name":"Science"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/space/","name":"Space"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/","name":"NASA Spotted an Object 3.3 Billion Miles Away From the Sun"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Astronaut plays bagpipes in space","description":"U.S. Astronaut Kjell Lindgren played","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/DmP3AOis/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2015-11-08T19:14:49.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/DmP3AOis.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/","duration":"PT1M9S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4140220/nasa-new-horizons-pluto-kuiper-belt/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```