2023-10-12 02:31:13
Updated Thursday, October 12, 2023 – 02:31
“This is the largest carbon-rich asteroid sample ever returned to Earth,” said NASA chief Bill Nelson.
Bill Nelson, head of NASA, explains the findings to the press in Houston (Texas).MARK FELIXAFPEspace NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission: 250 grams of material from the asteroid Bennu reach Earth
A sample collected from the 4.5 billion-year-old asteroid Bennu contains abundant water and carbon, as revealed by NASA, which offers greater support for the theory that life on Earth was seeded from outer space.
The discovery occurs after a seven year round trip to this distant rock, as part of the OSIRIS-REx mission, which dropped off its precious cargo in the Utah desert last month, which is undergoing careful scientific analysis.
“This is the largest carbon-rich asteroid sample ever returned to Earth,” said NASA chief Bill Nelson, at a press event at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, where the first images of black dust and pebbles.
Carbon accounted for almost 5% of the total weight of the sample and was present in both organic and mineral forms, while water was locked within the crystalline structure of the clay minerals, he said.
Scientists believe that the reason the Earth has oceans, lakes, and rivers is because it was hit by water-carrying asteroids between 4,000 and 4,500 million years ago, which made it a habitable planet.
Life on Earth is based on carbon, It forms bonds with other elements to produce proteins and enzymes, as well as the basic components of DNA and RNA.
The findings were made using a preliminary analysis which included scanning electron microscopy and X-ray computed tomography.
“This is an astrobiologist’s dream,” said the scientist. Daniel Glavin, adding that there is still much work to do and that the sample will be shared with laboratories around the world for further studies.
The largest sample of an asteroid
OSIRIS-REx was not the first probe to encounter an asteroid and bring back samples for study: Japan accomplished the feat twice, returning celestial dust in 2010 and 2020. But the amount obtained now, approximately 250 grams, far exceeds what the Japanese missions collected: Hayabusa2 achieved only 5.4 grams.
Bennu, named after an ancient Egyptian deity, is a “primordial artifact preserved in the vacuum of space,” according to NASA, making it an attractive target for study.
Bennu’s orbit, which crosses that of Earth, also made the round trip difficult. easier than going to the asteroid belt, which is located between Mars and Jupiter.
Later studies
Until now, researchers have not focused their efforts on the main sample itself, but on the “additional particles”, described as black powder and debris coating the sample collector.
“If everything goes according to plan, in about two weeks we hope to be in TAGSAM [como se conoce al recolector y recipiente principal de la muestra] and have an estimate of how much material we collected,” the mission’s principal investigator explained to AFP, Dante Lauretta.
In October 2020, when the OSIRIS-REx probe fired nitrogen gas at Bennu to collect its sample, a hatch meant to seal it was blown open by a chunk of rock, causing some of the finer material came out of the collector, without escaping completely. In the end, more material than expected arrived on Earth. Subsequently, an inspection of the rest of the sample will be carried out.
Bennu is believed to have formed from pieces of a larger asteroid in the asteroid belt, after a massive collision between 1,000 and 2,000 million years ago.
The analyzes will allow obtaining a inventory of the minerals observed and perhaps determine their proportion. In particular, scientists believe that Bennu contains hydrated minerals.
The study of asteroids should allow scientists better understand the formation of the solar system and how the Earth became habitable.
Some scientists believe that asteroids like Bennu could have brought to Earth the compounds that later allowed the birth of life.
NASA says to preserve at least 70% of the sample in Houston for future studies, a practice that began in the Apollo era with lunar rocks.
“The samples will then be available for new questions, new techniques, new instrumentation in the distant future,” said Eileen Stansbery, head of the astromaterials research division at the Johnson Space Center. Additional pieces will be sent for public display.
In addition to scientific knowledge, a better understanding of Bennu’s composition could prove useful if humanity ever needs to drive it away.
While the asteroid has no chance of hitting Earth until the mid-2100s, the chances increase by about 1 in 1,750 between then and the year 2300, NASA says.
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