If a planet is there, it’s extremely distant and will stay that way — with no chance of ever colliding with Earth, or bringing “days of darkness”, as suggested by doomsayers. According to SA, it is now harder to imagine our solar system without a Planet Nine than with one. “The signs so far are indirect, mainly its gravitatiol footprints, but that adds up to a compelling case nonetheless,” Batygin noted. Batygin and his co-author, Caltech astronomer Mike Brown, described the first three breadcrumbs on Planet Nine’s trail in a January 2016 paper, published in the Astronomical Jourl.