{"id":13088,"date":"2019-07-11T22:40:30","date_gmt":"2019-07-11T14:40:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/japanese-spacecraft-snags-second-sample-from-asteroid\/"},"modified":"2019-07-11T22:40:30","modified_gmt":"2019-07-11T14:40:30","slug":"japanese-spacecraft-snags-second-sample-from-asteroid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/japanese-spacecraft-snags-second-sample-from-asteroid\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese spacecraft snags second sample from asteroid"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
A camera on-board Hayabusa 2 shows the spacecraft\u2019s sampler horn contacting the asteroid\u2019s surface, then kicking up rocky debris after firing a sampling projectile. Credit: JAXA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Scientists celebrated another success with Japan\u2019s Hayabusa 2 spacecraft late Wednesday (U.S. time), when the robot explorer accomplished a second pinpoint touch-and-go landing on asteroid Ryugu, this time to collect a sample of pristine dust and rock excavated by an explosive impactor earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Using rocket thrusters to control its descent, and guided by a laser range finder, Hayabusa 2 glacially approached Ryugu on autopilot Wednesday, slowing to a relative speed of about 4 inches per second (10 centimeters) per second in the final phase of the landing.<\/p>\n

Hayabusa 2 maneuvered over a bright navigation aid released on the asteroid\u2019s surface earlier this year to mark the landing site, then went in for the final descent, with the probe\u2019s sampling horn extending from the front of the spacecraft.<\/p>\n

Telemetry data and imagery downlinked from Hayabusa 2 show the spacecraft briefly touched down on the asteroid at 9:06 p.m. EDT Wednesday (0106 GMT; 10:06 a.m. Japan Standard Time Thursday), and began climbing away from Ryugu seconds later, pulsing its thrusters to counteract the half-mile-wide (900-meter-wide) asteroid\u2019s feeble gravity.<\/p>\n

In a press conference around four hours later, officials hailed the brief landing as a perfect success, following the mission\u2019s first touch-and-go landing on Ryugu in February.<\/p>\n

\u201cHayabusa 2 today executed a second touchdown, and we were able to obtain (information about) the history of  the solar system,\u201d said Yuichi Tsuda, Hayabusa 2\u2019s project manager at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.<\/p>\n

Ground teams cheered when data streaming back from the spacecraft, currently orbiting the sun in lock-step with Ryugu more than 151 million miles (244 million kilometers) from Earth, confirmed the touchdown.<\/p>\n

Launched in December 2014, Hayabusa 2 is Japan\u2019s mission to travel to an asteroid and collect samples for return to Earth. Scientists are eager to analyze specimens from Ryugu, a dark asteroid rich in carbon, a critical building block of life.<\/p>\n

Researchers will study the samples for clues about the formation of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago, and perhaps the origin of water and life on Earth.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Yuichi Tsuda, Hayabusa 2\u2019s project manager, speaks with reporters Thursday. Credit: JAXA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mission managers last month decided to send Hayabusa 2 on a second sampling run to gather bits of rock and dust from a second location on Ryugu, providing scientists with more varied materials to examine when the mission returns to Earth late next year.<\/p>\n

Hayabusa 2\u2019s sampling mechanism works by firing a metal bullet into the asteroid once the probe\u2019s sampler horn contacts the surface. The projectile is designed to force bits of rock and dust through the sampler horn into a collection chamber inside spacecraft.<\/p>\n

Takanao Saiki, Hayabusa 2\u2019s project engineer and flight director at JAXA, told reporters in a press briefing Thursday that data downlinked by the spacecraft showed the temperature rose in the projectile\u2019s firing mechanism at the time of landing, suggesting the system functioned as intended.<\/p>\n

Three images taken by a camera on-board Hayabusa 2 showed the sampling horn contacting the asteroid, then violently blasting away debris from the surface. Countless tiny asteroid fragments were visible around the spacecraft in the final snapshot in the three-image sequence released by JAXA.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe third picture is really amazing,\u201d said Makoto Yoshikawa, Hayabusa 2\u2019s mission manager \u201cIt\u2019s really awesome, a large amount of chips of rocks are flying off.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a wonderful picture, I think,\u201d Tsuda said. \u201cHayabusa 2 touched the surface of Ryugu, so this is evidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

A different view of the landing site taken by Hayabusa 2\u2019s navigation camera shows a cloud of debris left behind moments after the spacecraft took off from the asteroid.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Hayabusa 2\u2019s navigation camera recorded this view of the spacecraft\u2019s landing site moments after the touch-and-go maneuver, showing a cloud of debris left in its wake. Credit: JAXA, University of Tokyo, Kochi University, Rikkyo University, Nagoya University, Chiba Institute of Technology, Meiji University, University of Aizu and AIST<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With its second and final sample collection complete, Hayabusa 2 started to climb back to a \u201chome position\u201d roughly 12 miles (20 kilometers) from the asteroid. The spacecraft closed the lid to the sample catcher device containing the asteroid pay dirt, and ground teams will later send commands to seal it inside the re-entry canister that will carry the material through Earth\u2019s atmosphere at the end of the mission.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s nothing I need to complain about, everything moved perfectly,\u201d Tsuda said through a translator. \u201cIt was a perfect operation, so \u2026 it\u2019s a 1,000 score out of 100.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not only did the specimens gathered Wednesday come from a different location on Ryugu than the first sampling run, scientists say the newly-captured materials originated from underneath the asteroid\u2019s surface, where they may have escaped radiation and other space weathering effects for billions of years.<\/p>\n

The pristine samples were exposed during a daring, unprecedented bombing run by the Hayabusa 2 spacecraft in April. The probe deployed an explosive charge to fire into the asteroid at high speed, carving a fresh crater and ejecting buried materials around the impact site, ripe for retrieval by Hayabusa 2.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe decided to obtain the samples in this particular area so that we would be able to sample the subsurface materials \u2026 and because our operation was perfectly conducted, therefore, we can observe that we obtained some subsurface samples,\u201d said Seiichiro Watanabe, Hayabusa 2\u2019s project scientist from Nagoya University.<\/p>\n

\u201cBringing the subsurface materials (back to Earth) will be something no other country can do in the coming 20 years or so,\u201d Watanabe said.<\/p>\n

Hayabusa 2\u2019s sampler carrier has three chambers to separate materials gathered from each landing. Officials decided to press ahead with the second sampling run after assessing the scientific benefits and engineering risks of the maneuver, but with two samples now on-board the spacecraft, mission managers do not plan to attempt a third sampling run.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Artist\u2019s concept of the Hayabusa 2 spacecraft touching down on asteroid Ryugu. Credit: JAXA\/Akihiro Ikeshita<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While Hayabusa 2 explores Ryugu, NASA\u2019s OSIRIS-REx mission is surveying asteroid Bennu before moving in to collect a sample there in 2020 for return to scientists on Earth in 2023.<\/p>\n

OSIRIS-REx is designed to bring home at least 60 grams, or 2.1 ounces of samples from Bennu, significantly more than Hayabusa 2. But OSIRIS-REx is only expected to collect a single sample from one location on Bennu\u2019s surface.<\/p>\n

NASA and JAXA agreed in 2014 to share their asteroid samples.<\/p>\n

Named for a dragon\u2019s palace in a famous Japanese fairy tale, asteroid Ryugu completes one circuit of the sun every 1.3 years. Its path briefly brings it inside Earth\u2019s orbit, making Ryugu a potentially hazardous asteroid.<\/p>\n

The orbit also made Ryugu an attractive candidate for a sample return mission.<\/p>\n

The Hayabusa 2 spacecraft arrived at Ryugu in June 2018, and deployed three mobile scouts to hop around the asteroid\u2019s surface last September and October, achieving another first in space exploration.<\/p>\n

Hayabusa 2 will depart Ryugu in November or December and fire its ion engines to head for Earth, where it will release a re-entry capsule protected by a heat shield to land in Australia in December 2020.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have captured the samples,\u201d Tsuda said. \u201cWe must make sure that it comes back to Earth, so we need to continue with the operations properly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A camera on-board Hayabusa 2 shows the spacecraft\u2019s sampler horn contacting the asteroid\u2019s surface, then kicking up rocky debris after firing a sampling projectile. Credit: JAXA Scientists celebrated another success with Japan\u2019s Hayabusa 2 spacecraft late Wednesday (U.S. time), when the robot explorer accomplished a second pinpoint touch-and-go landing on asteroid Ryugu, this time to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1519,1965,377,877,1561,2168,1563],"class_list":["post-13088","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-asteroids","tag-hayabusa-2","tag-japan","tag-jaxa","tag-planetary-science","tag-ryugu","tag-solar-system"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13088"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13088"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13088\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}