Asteroids Archives

September 20, 2019September 20, 2019 by Matt Williams

Hayabusa 2 has one Last Lander it’s Going to Throw at Ryugu

On June 27th, 2018, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency‘s (JAXA) Hayabusa2 spacecraft reached asteroid 162173 Ryugu. As part of JAXA’s program to study Near-Earth Asteroids (NEAs), this mission has spent over a year conducting landing operations, shooting up the surface with “bullets” and an anti-tank warhead, and collecting samples from the surface and interior that will eventually be returned to Earth.

This past Monday (Sept. 16th), Hayabusa2 released two target markers as part of its “target marker separation operation” (which ran from Sept. 12th to Sept. 17th). This consisted of two 10 cm (4 in) balls covered in reflective material being released in orbit around Ryugu. This operation puts the mission a step closer to the deployment of the mission’s MINERVA-II2 Rover-2, which will be landing on the asteroid’s surface next month.

September 17, 2019September 17, 2019 by Evan Gough

Metallic Asteroids Might Have Had Volcanoes Erupting Molten Iron. That’s So Metal

This diagram depicts a theoretical phenomenon called ferrovolcanism, where metallic asteroids erupt molten iron in a class of asteroids called pallasites. The ferrovolcanism might result when pockets of melted alloy rise to the surface. An upcoming NASA space mission to the asteroid Psyche may allow scientists to confirm their theory. (Purdue University image/James Keane)

Remember the asteroid Psyche? It’s the largest known asteroid in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. It’s been in the news because of its unusual properties, and because NASA plans to launch a mission to Psyche in 2022.

Psyche, aka 16 Psyche, is unusual because it’s quite different from other asteroids. Psyche appears to be the remnant, exposed nickel-iron core of an early planet. Because of that, Psyche is a building block left over from the early Solar System, when planets were still forming. It’s like a planet without a crust.

July 30, 2019July 30, 2019 by Evan Gough

Watch this Amazing Video of Hayabusa 2 Picking Up a Sample from the Surface of Ryugu

A screen shot from JAXA's video showing Hayabusa 2's second sample grabbing touchdown. Image Credit: JAXA

A new video shows Japan’s Hayabusa 2 sample return spacecraft collecting samples from asteroid Ryugu. The spacecraft has been at Ryugu for months now, and it’s all been leading up to this. In the video, you can clearly see airborne asteroid dust and particles swirling around in the low gravity.

July 18, 2019July 18, 2019 by Evan Gough

Asteroid 2006 QV89 Now Has a 0% Chance of Hitting Earth in September

An artistic composite image of asteroid Lutetia, which flew by Earth in March, 2014. Image Credit; ESA

Why report on an asteroid that has no chance of hitting Earth? Because this asteroid, known as 2006 QV89, has a history. A history of being kind of hard to track.

June 25, 2019June 25, 2019 by Evan Gough

Hubble is the Ultimate Multitasker: Discovering Asteroids While it’s Doing Other Observations

Some asteroids from within our Solar System have photobombed deep images of the Universe taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. These asteroids reside, on average, only about 260 million kilometres from Earth — right around the corner in astronomical terms. Yet they've horned their way into this picture of thousands of galaxies scattered across space and time at inconceivably farther distances. This Hubble photo of a random patch of sky is part of the Frontier Fields survey. The colourful image contains thousands of galaxies, including massive yellowish ellipticals and majestic blue spirals. Much smaller, fragmentary blue galaxies are sprinkled throughout the field. The reddest objects are most likely the farthest galaxies, whose light has been stretched into the red part of the spectrum by the expansion of space. Intruding across the picture are asteroid trails that appear as curved or S-shaped streaks. Rather than leaving one long trail, the asteroids appear in multiple Hubble exposures that have been combined into one image. Of the 20 total asteroid sightings for this field, seven are unique objects. Of these seven asteroids, only two were earlier identified. The others were too faint to be seen previously. The trails look curved due to an observational effect called parallax. As Hubble orbits around Earth, an asteroid will appear to move along an arc with respect to the vastly more distant background stars and galaxies. The motion of Earth around the Sun, and the motion of the asteroids along their orbits, are other contributing factors to the apparent skewing of asteroid paths. All the asteroids were found manually, the majority by "blinking" consecutive exposures to capture apparent asteroid motion. Astronomers found a unique asteroid for every 10 to 20 hours of exposure time. The Frontier Fields program is a collaboration among several space telescopes and ground-based observatories to study six massive galaxy clusters and their effects. Using a diff

It looks like a poster of the famous Hubble Deep Field, marked with white streaks by a child, or put away carelessly and scratched in the process. But it’s not. The white streaks aren’t accidents; they’re the paths of asteroids.

June 7, 2019June 11, 2019 by Matt Williams

The Japanese asteroid-hunter had another photo opportunity when it dropped a target marker on asteroid Ryugu

Image taken with Hayabusa2's CAM-H instrument on May 30th, 2019. Credit: JAXA

The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency‘s (JAXA) has made some impressive feats in recent years. Roughly one year ago, and following in the footsteps of its predecessor, their Hayabusa2 spacecraft successfully rendezvoused with a Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA) – 162173 Ryugu. Since then, it has been collecting samples from the surface in the hopes of learning more about the formation and evolution of the Solar System.

Just a few months after the spacecraft created an artificial crater with an anti-tank warhead, the spacecraft has once again descended close to the asteroid to drop another target marker. This maker, a reflective sphere that contains the names of people who’ve supported the mission, will provide a visual guide as the spacecraft attempts to collect its second sample of material from the asteroid’s surface.

June 7, 2019June 7, 2019 by Evan Gough

Don’t Worry About Asteroid 2006QV89. There’s Only a 1 in 7000 Chance It’ll Hit the Earth in September

One of the many PHOs (Potentially Hazardous Objects) that we're keeping an eye on. Image Credit: NASA

Whenever scientists announce an upcoming close encounter with an asteroid, certain corners of the internet light up like the synaptic rush that accompanies a meth binge, with panicky headlines shouted straight from the brain stem. But never mind that. We’re not that corner of the internet. We’re sober, yo!

May 8, 2019May 9, 2019 by Susie Murph

Weekly Space Hangout: May 8, 2019 – Dr. Henry Hsieh talks Active Asteroids

Hosts:
Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain)
Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier )
Dr. Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg & ChartYourWorld.org)
Dr. Paul M. Sutter (pmsutter.com / @PaulMattSutter)

Continue reading “Weekly Space Hangout: May 8, 2019 – Dr. Henry Hsieh talks Active Asteroids”

May 1, 2019May 1, 2019 by Evan Gough

The World’s Space Agencies are Responding to a Hypothetical Asteroid Impact. You Can Watch it all Unfold Online.

Remember when Orson Welles’ 1938 radio show called “The War of the Worlds” fooled people into thinking that Earth was actually being invaded? That was fun.

Now, the ESA (European Space Agency) is tempting fate by live-tweeting the hypothetical approach of the hypothetical asteroid 2019PDC and hypothetically planning a hypothetical response to this hypothetically destructive asteroid. In their hypothetical scenario, 2019 PDC has a 1 in 10 chance of striking Earth in 2029. And you can follow the action on Twitter.

April 28, 2019April 28, 2019 by Matt Williams

Here’s the Video of Hayabusa2 Bombing Asteroid Ryugu

Artist's impression of the Hayabusa2 spacecraft touching down on the surface of the asteroid Ryugu. Credit: JAXA/Akihiro Ikeshita?

As part of its mission to explore the Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA)
162173 Ryugu, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency‘s (JAXA) Hayabusa2 spacecraft recently dropped a “bomb” on the asteroid’s surface. This explosive package, known as the Small Carry-on Impactor (SCI), was specifically designed to create a crater in the surface, thus exposing the interior for analysis.

The deployment of the SCI took place on April 5th, exactly six weeks after the spacecraft collected its first sample from the surface. Last Sunday, (April 21st, 2019), JAXA provided the video of the “bombing run” via the mission’s official twitter account. This was followed four days later by images of the crater that resulted, which revealed darker material from the interior that was now exposed to space.