A newly discovered comet may be visible to the naked eye as it passes Earth and the Sun in the coming weeks for the first time in 50,000 years.

This handout image obtained from the NASA website on January 6, 2022 depicts Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF), which was discovered this year in early March by astronomers using the wide-field survey camera at the Zwicky Transient Facility. According to astronomers, a newly discovered comet is currently shooting through our Solar System for the first time in 50,000 years and may be visible to the naked eye as it whizzes past Earth and the Sun in the coming weeks. It will pass closest to the Sun on January 12 after traveling from the icy reaches of our Solar System, and it will pass closest to Earth on February 1. 

📷: Dan Bartlett / NASA / AFP

PARIS, France — A newly discovered comet may be visible to the naked eye as it passes Earth and the Sun in the coming weeks for the first time in 50,000 years, according to astronomers. 

The comet is known as C/2022 E3 (ZTF) after the Zwicky Transient Facility, which discovered it in March of last year as it passed Jupiter. 

After leaving the icy reaches of our Solar System, it will pass closest to the Sun on January 12 and the Earth on February 1. 

If the sky is not overly illuminated by city lights or the Moon, it should be easy to spot with a good pair of binoculars, and possibly even with the naked eye. 

The comet last passed Earth during the Upper Paleolithic period, when Neanderthals roamed the planet. 

The comet's next visit to the inner Solar System is expected in another 50,000 years, according to Thomas Prince, a physics professor at the California Institute of Technology who works at the Zwicky Transient Facility. 

The closer the comet gets to Earth, the easier it is to measure its composition "as the Sun boils off its outer layers,"

 according to Prince. 

This "rare visitor" will provide "information about the inhabitants of our Solar system that extends far beyond the most distant planets," 

he added.

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