After its remarkable Pluto flyby this past summer, NASA's spacecraft New Horizons has a new possible destination - a small cosmic object in the Kuiper Belt.

The Kuiper Belt object, dubbed 2014 MU69, is nearly a billion miles past Pluto. NASA scientists choose it as one of two space objects that New Horizons is capable of reaching with its remaining fuel.

Using various powerful telescopes, scientists have been searching for viable flyby objects since the year of 2011. The second object for the spacecraft's upcoming missions is yet to be identified. New Horizons is designed to last for several years past its flyby date.

Alan Stern, Principal Investigator for New Horizons mission, said, "2014 MU69 is a great choice because it is just the kind of ancient KBO, formed where it orbits now, that the Decadal Survey desired us to fly by. Moreover, this KBO costs less fuel to reach [than other candidate targets]…"

Consumption of less fuel will leave greater fuel reserves to protect against the unforeseen. The spacecraft made its Pluto flyby this past summer, but the biggest payoff from that flyby is still months away as data collected by the spacecraft is yet to come.

New Horizons is, currently, more than 3 billion miles from Earth. According to mission scientist, the spacecraft is fit and healthy to make more explorations.