What is an asteroid? Where do they come from? This NASA mission brings samples of asteroids…
NASA has defined asteroids as small rocky objects that orbit the sun like planets, but are much smaller in size. Most of these are found in the major asteroid belts, which are the region between the orbit of Mars and Jupiter.
Asteroids (representative image)
After more than 1,000 people were injured after the Chelyabinsk Meteor Airburst incident above Russia in 2013, it is clear that the chance of being hit by an asteroid is not fiction. Although asteroids continue to pass near Earth’s orbit, it is estimated that the chances of death for people who die due to impacts are about one in 200,000.
What is an asteroid?
NASA has defined asteroids as small rocky objects that orbit the sun like planets, but are much smaller in size. Most of these are found in the major asteroid belts, which are the region between the orbit of Mars and Jupiter. However, some asteroids were found in the orbital paths of the planet and followed the same path around the sun. There are such asteroids on Earth.
How do asteroids form?
Asteroids are as old as our solar system because they are leftovers formed by our solar system, which began about 4.6 billion years after the collapse of gas and dust about 4.6 billion years ago. Although most of the materials fall in the center of the clouds and form the sun, some condensed dust in the clouds becomes planets. However, objects in the asteroid belt never had a chance to be incorporated into a planet. They became asteroids.
Are asteroids like planets?
Since they are formed in different places and at different distances from the sun, no two asteroids are similar. They are also not like the shape of a planet, but the planets are round and the asteroids are irregular in shape. They also vary in size, with some hundreds of miles in diameter and others as small as pebbles.
NASA’s Asteroid Mission
Asteroids can provide scientists with a lot of information about the history of the solar system because they form at the same time as other objects. They can provide important information about meteorites whose tiny asteroids have flew through our atmosphere and landed on the surface of the Earth.
NASA has launched a number of space missions to study asteroids. The nearby Shoemaker spacecraft landed on the asteroid Eros near Earth in 2001. The Dawn spacecraft was sent to the asteroid belt in 2011. It rotated and studied the asteroid Vesta and the Dwarf Planet Valley.
In addition, NASA also launched the Osiris-Rex spacecraft in 2016, studying the asteroids near Earth called Bennu. It also scooped dust and rock samples from the surface of the asteroid and sent it to Earth. Samples of the container landed in the Utah desert in September 2023. Scientists are studying dust and rocks to learn about the formation of planets and the beginning of life.
