Bits of pebbles and dust from the asteriod Bennu that were collected during the long journey of the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft should be landing in the Utah desert later this month. The delivery will be a first for NASA -- its first sample return from an asteroid and one of a very small handful of space …
New Research Finds The Very Early Solar System Went Through an Especially Intense Period of Asteroid Collisions
In the earliest days of our solar system -- before any planets had been cobbled together -- the recently formed Sun was circled by cosmic gas and dust. Over time, fragments of rock formed from the dust and many of these orbiting rocks smashed together and some became the gradually larger components of planets-to-be. Others …
Can We Trust a Handful of Grains to Tell Us About the Early Earth? A Look at the Hayabusa2 Asteroid Sample
The Hayabusa2 sample return capsule returning to Earth. The bright streak in the sky is the capsule, shock heated as it enters the Earth's atmosphere. The bright lights on the ground are buildings. (JAXA) In the early hours of December 6, 2020, what appeared to be a shooting star blazed across the sky above the …
Metal Mini-Asteroids Detected Passing Near Earth, Offering Potentially Great Science and Maybe Future Mining
Metal asteroids offer something rare in the solar system -- the core of a planet without all the rock that normally surrounds it. Since it is impossible to directly examine a planetary or lunar core if the parent body remains intact, metal-rich asteroids where the upper mantle and crust layers have been lost to a …
Japan’s Hayabusa2 Mission Returns to Earth
Fireball created by the Hayabusa2 re-entry capsule as it passes through the Earth's atmosphere towards the ground (JAXA). In the mission control room in Japan, all eyes were fixed on one of the large screens that ran along the far wall. The display showed the night sky, with stars twinkling in the blackness. We were …
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Cores, Planets and The Mission to Psyche
Deep inside the rocky planets of our solar system, as well as some solar system moons, is an iron-based core. Some, such as Earth's core, have an inner solid phase and outer molten phase, but the solar system cores studied so far are of significantly varied sizes and contain a pretty wide variety of elements …
Hayabusa2 Snatches Second Asteroid Sample
Artist impression of the Hayabusa2 spacecraft touching down on asteroid Ryugu (JAXA / Akihiro Ikeshita) “1… 2… 3… 4…” The counting in the Hayabusa2 control room at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Institute of Space and Astronautical Sciences (JAXA, ISAS) took on a rhythmic beat as everyone in the room took up the chant, their …
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Asteroid Remains Around Dead Stars Reveal the Likely Fate of Our Solar System
June 30th has been designated “Asteroid Day” to promote awareness of these small members of our solar system. But while asteroids are often discussed in the context of the risk they might pose to the Earth, their chewed up remains around other stars may also reveal the fate of our solar system. It is 6.5 …
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Primordial Asteroids, And The Stories They Are Telling
Asteroid, we've long been told, started tiny in our protoplanetary disk and only very gradually became more massive through a process of accretion. They collected dust from the gas cloud that surrounded our new star, and then grew larger through collisions with other growing asteroids. But in recent years, a new school of thought …
Continue reading "Primordial Asteroids, And The Stories They Are Telling"
Primordial Asteroids, And The Stories They Are Telling
Asteroid, we've long been told, started tiny in our protoplanetary disk and only very gradually became more massive through a process of accretion. They collected dust from the gas cloud that surrounded our new star, and then grew larger through collisions with other growing asteroids. But in recent years, a new school of thought has …
Continue reading "Primordial Asteroids, And The Stories They Are Telling"
Many Worlds 