(CNN) This week, the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft conducted a final rehearsed of all of the maneuvers it will need to touchdown on the asteroid Bennu and collect a sample from it in the fall.
Many things are taking place:
Cosmic Detective Work: Asteroid Fragments May Have Jumped the Gap in the Early Solar System
Using some cosmic detective work, a team of researchers has found evidence that tiny pieces of asteroids from the inner solar system may have crossed a gap to the outer solar system, a feat once thought to be unlikely.
Against the odds, however, a team of researchers including Associate Research Professor Devin L. Schrader and Research Scientist Jemma Davidson of Arizona State University’s Center for Meteorite Studies have found evidence in meteorites that tiny fragments of asteroids from the inner solar system crossed the Jupiter Gap into the outer solar system. The results of their study have been recently published in Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta .
Ride shotgun with NASA's OSIRIS-REx asteroid probe as it buzzes Bennu (video) | Space
Want to see what things are like on a space rock tens of millions of miles away from Earth? NASA has you covered.
Right now, the near-Earth asteroid Bennu is about 180 million miles (290 million kilometers) away, and with it is a NASA spacecraft called OSIRIS-REx . The probe will attempt a difficult goal this fall: snatching a piece of space rock to bring home to Earth.
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So before the big day, OSIRIS-REx is practicing its moves — and the resulting footage is just as cool as you'd expect from a piece of machinery that flew just 130 feet (40 meters) above a rubble-covered space rock, according to a statement . That height is the equivalent of standing on the roof of an 11-story building and looking down.
Heavy Metal Psyche: Biggest Main Belt Asteroid Might Be Planet Remnant
New study of biggest Main Belt asteroid, Psyche, finds it might be remnant of a planet that never fully formed.
“This mission will be the first to visit a metallic asteroid, and the more we, the scientific community, know about Psyche prior to launch, the more likely the mission will have the most appropriate tools for examining Psyche and collecting data,” said Wendy K. Caldwell, Los Alamos National Laboratory Chick Keller Postdoctoral Fellow and lead author on a paper published recently in the journal Icarus .
Quite a lot has been going on:
Asteroid news: NASA pinpoints when 'potentially hazardous' space rock will fly past Earth |
The space agency’s CNEOS classifies Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) as comets and asteroids nudged by the gravitational attraction of nearby planets into the Sun's orbits.
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Although comets were formed in the cold outer planetary system, the majority of asteroids are created inside the solar system between the orbits of red planet Mars and gas giant Jupiter.
The CNEOS database reveals the asteroid will pass by the Earth on September 1 at 3.49pm BST (10.49am ET).
Is Asteroid Mining Really Our Best Argument for Bitcoin Over Gold? - CoinDesk
After a Winklevoss encounter highlights Elon Musk's space mining dreams, maybe we should remind ourselves of the right-here-at-home benefits bitcoin brings.
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Earlier this week, the Winklevoss brothers introduced Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy to bitcoin .
One of the notable parts of the recap video was a discussion of how Elon Musk was set to destroy the value of gold on Earth by mining gold from asteroids.
Asteroid 2020 ND to pass by Earth in July 2020: Date, India Time, NASA Asteroid Warning - All you
NASA has issued a warning that a huge "Asteroid 2020 ND" will move past Earth on July 24. The asteroid, about 170 metres-long, will be as close as 0.034 astronomical units (5,086,328 kilometres) to our planet, and is travelling at a speed of 48,000 kilometres per hour. Its distance from Earth has placed it in the "potentially dangerous" category.
According to NASA, "Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) are currently defined based on parameters that measure the asteroid's potential to make threatening close approaches to the Earth. Specifically, all asteroids with a minimum orbit intersection distance (MOID) of 0.05 au or less are considered PHAs."
An asteroid the size of a car just zipped by Earth in close flyby | Space
A car-sized asteroid discovered over the weekend made a close flyby of Earth today (July 28), passing our planet at a range that rivals the orbits of some high-flying satellites.
The asteroid 2020 OY4, which was first detected on Sunday (July 26), made its closest approach today at 1:31 a.m. EDT (0531 GMT) when it zipped by Earth at a speed of about 27,700 mph (44,600 km/h), according to the European Space Agency . The asteroid is just under 10 feet (3 meters) wide and posed no impact risk to Earth, but did approach the flight paths of geosynchronous satellites.
Happening on Twitter
Tomorrow, @OSIRISREx will perform "Matchpoint" – the spacecraft's final rehearsal before swooping down to snag a pi… https://t.co/EwP73IsLGI NASA_Marshall (from Huntsville, Alabama USA) Mon Aug 10 16:40:02 +0000 2020
Practice makes perfect! 🌑 Follow along with @OSIRISREx at 2:30 p.m. ET for a play-by-play of the final rehearsal fo… https://t.co/rzDqYUlTSQ NASA_LSP (from Kennedy Space Center, FL) Tue Aug 11 14:07:23 +0000 2020
Matchpoint rehearsal complete ✔️ Yesterday, @NASA's @OSIRISREx performed its final practice run of the sampling s… https://t.co/TyxUjFP8Z4 NASAAstrobio (from Around the globe...and beyond!) Wed Aug 12 20:46:08 +0000 2020
NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft prepares for final asteroid-sampling rehearsal https://t.co/oe6QB0WV1Q https://t.co/NdmQKSOhLM SPACEdotcom (from NYC) Sat Aug 08 11:16:04 +0000 2020
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