Nasa: imminent asteroid missions could reveal our origins an… – MENAFN.COM

  • Date: 16-Oct-2021
  • Source: MENAFN
  • Sector:Defense
  • Country:Middle East
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Nasa: imminent asteroid missions could reveal our origins an… – MENAFN.COM

(MENAFN- The Conversation) Asteroids are remnants of the early Solar System, with the potential to reveal secrets of our planet's origins. But they could also bring an end to life on Earth. Now two missions, Lucy and DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) will provide further insights into both of these features – with DART even attempting to redirect the orbit of a moon around an asteroid. Space rocks are generally considered to be asteroids if they are larger than approximately 1km in size, and made principally of"non-volatile" materials – chemicals which can be easily vaporised. Carbon monoxide, for example, is volatile as it vaporises at a temperature of -191°C. But iron, with a vaporisation point of 2, 862°C is non-volatile. This is somewhat different to comets . Asteroids are found more commonly in the inner Solar System, whereas comets with their volatile-rich composition tend to lurk in the outer part, far from the heat of the Sun. Some 500, 000 asteroids have been catalogued to date, and many have small moons of their own. Asteroid montage (Not to scale) NASA/ESA Asteroids are thought to be the remnants of planetesimals – precursors of the planets in the early Solar System, which