The atmosphere in space above Earth is full of dead satellites, broken pieces of spacecraft and even the odd tool dropped by astronauts.

Satellites and the International Space Station are increasingly having to take evasive manoeuvres to avoid some of this debris. As it all whizzes around space so quickly, even a marble-sized piece of metal could prove deadly to a spacecraft.

Now, a team at the University of Southampton has said that space is becoming even more crowded with trash. Although a lot of space junk will eventually burn up as it spirals into Earth’s orbit, this is happening less because of changes to this part of space, known as the thermosphere. Because this area is cooling down, fewer molecules of gas are being warmed up enough to rise to the heights that the junk orbits at. This in turn means that there is a lower drag force on the bits of rubbish and they stay in orbit for a longer time.

However, the problem is that no-one really has any ideas about how to clear the rubbish up that will be technically possible and not cost too much money.