How a new planetarium show helped scientists unlock a cosmic secret

NEW YORK | Scientists have unlocked one of the solar system’s many secrets from an unexpected source: a planetarium show opening to the public on Monday.

At the American Museum of Natural History last fall, experts were hard at work preparing “Encounters in the Milky Way,” a deep dive into our home galaxy shaped by the movements of stars and other celestial objects.

They were fine-tuning a scene featuring what’s known as the Oort Cloud, a region far beyond Pluto filled with icy relics from the solar system’s formation. Comets can hurtle toward Earth from the cloud, but scientists have never glimpsed its true shape.

One evening while watching the Oort Cloud scene, scientists noticed something strange projected onto the planetarium’s dome.

“Why is there a spiral there?” said the museum’