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A picture of the ORISIS-REx sampler head, which is wedged open by rocks. NASA.
On October 20 th, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft gently touched the Bennu asteroid, discharge a puff of air, and gathered the firm’s first sample of free-range asteroid rubble. However NASA is now racing to secure the sample, as OSIRIS-REx’s collection head is wedged open and gradually losing product that it dared to take from a roaming space rock.
OSIRIS-REx launched in 2016 to obstruct and gather a sample from the 1640- foot-wide Bennu asteroid. Its objective, to collect at least 60 grams of material from the space rock, could assist in research in chemistry, planetary science, and other big-brain topics. While we have plenty of meteorite samples, asteroids are “unpolluted,” as they haven’t passed through our atmosphere.
NASA is extremely severe about its 60- gram goal, and even planned to send poor OSIRIS-REx back to Bennu if it didn’t gather sufficient product. The firm is dealing with a various problem.
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