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asteroids

Space

Absolutely enormous asteroid belt discovered around a nearby star

Astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope to spot strange asteroid belts around the nearby star Fomalhaut, along with evidence for at least three planets

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Samples from asteroid Ryugu contain one of the building blocks of RNA

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Grains from Ryugu

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Asteroids that speed up unexpectedly may be ‘dark comets’ in disguise

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Asteroid moonlet Dimorphos as seen by the DART spacecraft 11 seconds before impact. DART?s onboard DRACO imager captured this image from a distance of 42 miles (68 kilometers). This image was the last to contain all of Dimorphos in the field of view. Dimorphos is roughly 525 feet (160 meters) in length. Dimorphos? north is toward the top of the image. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL

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What we learned from NASA's asteroid-smashing DART mission

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View of asteroid Ryugu from Hayabusa 2. Credits: JAXA, University of Tokyo & collaborators

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Hayabusa 2 has brought back gases from an asteroid for the first time

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This image from ASI?s LICIACube show the plumes of ejecta streaming from the Dimorphos asteroid after NASA?s Double Asteroid Redirect Test, or DART, mission, made impact with it on Sept. 26, 2022. Each rectangle represents a different level of contrast in order to better see fine structure in the plumes. By studying these streams of material, we will be able to learn more about the asteroid and the impact process. Credits: ASI/NASA/APL

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NASA’s DART mission moved an asteroid's orbit by smashing into it

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Fragments of a meteorite near the sun, huge stone rocks fly at the space. Elements of this image furnished by NASA.; Shutterstock ID 1969898527; purchase_order: -; job: -; client: -; other: -

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Astronomers found a weird asteroid closer to the sun than any other

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Astronomers using the NSF???s NOIRLab???s SOAR telescope in Chile captured the vast plume of dust and debris blasted from the surface of the asteroid Dimorphos by NASA???s DART spacecraft when it impacted on 26 September 2022. In this image, the more than 10,000 kilometer long dust trail ??? the ejecta that has been pushed away by the Sun???s radiation pressure, not unlike the tail of a comet ??? can be seen stretching from the center to the right-hand edge of the field of view.

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Photo shows 10,000 km debris tail caused by DART asteroid smash

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An artist's impression of the Kuiper belt

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A long-lost rogue planet could explain unexpectedly distant asteroids

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Hubble and JWST both saw the aftermath of NASA's DART asteroid mission

After NASA’s DART mission slammed into the asteroid Dimorphos, the Hubble Space Telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope took simultaneous pictures of what was left behind

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For the first time, NASA?s James Webb Space Telescope and Hubble Space Telescope have taken simultaneous observations of the same target. These images, Hubble on left and Webb on the right, show observations of the Didymos-Dimorphos system several hours after NASA?s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) intentionally impacted the moonlet asteroid. It was the world?s first test of the kinetic impact technique using a spacecraft to deflect an asteroid by modifying its orbit. Both Webb and Hubble observed the asteroid before and after the collision took place. Scientists will use the combined observations from Hubble and Webb to gain knowledge about the nature of the surface of Dimorphos, how much material was ejected by the collision, how fast it was ejected, and the distribution of particle sizes in the expanding dust cloud. In the coming months, scientists will also use Webb?s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) and Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) to observe ejecta from Dimorphos further. Spectroscopic data will provide researchers with insight into the asteroid?s composition. Hubble will monitor Dimorphos ten more times over the next three weeks to monitor how the ejecta cloud expands and fades over time. Hubble observations were conducted in one filter, WFC3/UVIS F350LP (assigned the color blue), while Webb observed at F070W (0.7 microns, assigned the color red).

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First images show aftermath of NASA's DART asteroid collision mission

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Earth

A second asteroid may have struck Earth when the dinosaurs died out

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Earth

The hunt for hidden impact craters that could reveal Earth’s deep past

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Asteroid Bennu may have got its spinning-top shape from landslides

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