Dear MEL Topic Readers,
Hayabusa-2: Pieces of an asteroid found inside space capsule
Ryugu is an asteroid that orbits the Sun every 16 months at a distance between 1 to 1.4 astronomical units, approximately equal to the mean distance between Earth and Sun. It only measures about one kilometer in diameter and was traveling at a speed of over 117,000 km per hour when Hayabusa 2, Japan’s sample collection space probe, rendezvoused in June 2018. The probe surveyed the asteroid for 18 months, left it in November 2019, and dropped the samples to Earth on December 5, 2020. It is quite amazing to have chased this fast-moving tiny object in deep space, laned and collected samples of the soil and gas, flew back to Earth and dropped the capsule safely that contained the invaluable samples.
But why did Japan spend so much time, manpower, fund other resources to investigate tiny particles of the small asteroid? That’s because the asteroid is thought to preserve the most pristine, untainted materials in our solar system, which could provide scientists with clues about the origin and evolution of the inner planets like ours as well as the origin of water and organic compounds, the sources of live forms.
The returned samples are going to be shared with other scientists and institutions in the world to study our origins, which were formed over 4.6 billion years ago.
As for Hayabusa 2, it is still flying in deep space for the next mission.
Enjoy reading the article and learn about this astonishing mission
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