Asteroid Racing Towards Earth at 104,761 KMPH Today, Reveals NASA | Key Details
NASA Space Technology Asteroid 2024 RN16, 110 feet wide, will pass Earth today at 104,761 km/h, 1.6 million km away. NASA monitors it; no impact threat expected.
Asteroid Racing Towards Earth at 104,761 KMPH Today, Reveals NASA | Key Details | Image: Unsplash
Earth is set to temporarily capture a small asteroid, named 2024 PT5, from September 29 to November 25. Discovered by NASAs ATLAS system, this 10-meter-wide asteroid will make a horseshoe-shaped path around Earth but will not complete a full orbit.Similar to asteroid 2022 NX1, 2024 PT5 is a natural object, likely originating from the Arjuna asteroid belt.
While Earth has previously captured asteroids into its orbit, sometimes for complete revolutions, PT5 will escape after 53 days. This brief encounter offers a rare glimpse into Earths interactions with space, showcasing how our planet can influence nearby celestial objects.
An image of Didymos and Dimorphos comprising of data collected by DART (NASA), Hayabusa (JAXA), Hayabusa-2 (JAXA) and OSIRIS-REX (NASA).(Image credit: A. Duchene and C. Robin (ISAE-SUPAERO).)
Scientists have used images collected by NASA‘s DART asteroid impact mission to paint a more detailed picture of its asteroid targets Didymos and Dimorphos. The research could help better understand the formation and evolution of binary asteroids such as these.
DARTwhich stands for “Double Asteroid Redirection Test,” only impacted the smaller body in this double-asteroid binary system, the moonletDimorphoswhich orbits the larger space rock Didymos. Still, the aim was to see what influence such an impact would have on both bodies. The data collected during this successful mission could help scientists better plan a planetary defense mission to divert an asteroid on a collision course with Earth.
Before crashing into Dimorphos on Sept. 26, 2023, DART was able to take images of the two near-Earth asteroids. In unison with data from the Light Italian Cubesat for Imaging of Asteroids (LICIACube) mission, researchers were able to determine some of Didymos and Dimorphos’s geological features and physical properties.
The team, led by Olivier Barnouin from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, studied the surface of Didymos, the larger of the two asteroids. The researchers found that at high elevations, Didymos is rough and hosts large boulders between 33 and 525 feet (10–160 meters) long and several craters. At low elevations, this asteroid’s surface becomes smoother, with fewer large rocks and craters.
Its smaller moonlet companion, Dimorphos, has rocks across its surface that have a wider range of sizes. While the surface of Dimorphos is mostly craterless, it is riven with several cracks or “faults.”
The findings helped Barnouin and colleagues determine that Dimorphos likely formed from material flung away from Didymos and then clumped together under the influence of gravity.
The team used the number of craters on both asteroids to gauge the ages of the two asteroids. they determined that the parent body Didymos is 12.5 million years old, between 40 to 130 times older than Dimorphos. They estimated the age of the moonlet to be around 0.3 million years.
Breaking space news, the latest updates on rocket launches, skywatching events and more!
Bolder fractures on the surface of Dimorphos captured by DART just before impact (Image credit: A. Lucchetti et al., Nature Communications)
Looking at the size of boulders and their distribution across Dimorphos, a separate team of scientists led by Maurizio Pajola from the INAF – Astronomical Observatory of Padova determined that they formed at different times rather than all at once.
This implies that the rocks on the surface of Dimorphos are directly inherited from Didymos, further supporting the idea that the moonlets in binary asteroid systems form from material shed by their larger partners. This process would also explain a distinctive ridge at the equator of the parent body, Didymos.
Another team of researchers led by Naomi Murdoch from the Université de Toulouse looked at boulder tracks traced across the surface of Didymos. They found the surface of Didymos is composed of very loose material, capable of supporting much less weight than dry sand on Earth or lunar soil on the moon.
Meanwhile, Alice Lucchetti, from the INAF-Astronomical Observatory of Padova also and colleagues found that boulders at the surface of Dimorphos are being fractured over a period of around 100,000 years by a process called “thermal fatigue,” which results from changing temperatures causing micro-fractures in the rock.
Though 100,000 years may seem like an incredibly long time to us, in geological terms, it is a short period, especially in a solar system that is around 4.6 billion years old. This means that the thermal fatigue experienced by Dimorphos is rapid. This is the first time that rapid thermal fatigue has been seen on a rocky asteroid made up of silicate materials and nickel-iron.
A comparison of rocks on Dimorphos, Itokawa, Ryugu, and Bennu. (Image credit: A. Duchene and C. Robin (ISAE-SUPAERO).)
A third team, led by Université de Toulouse researcher Colas Robin, compared 34 boulders on the surface of Dimorphos that ranged from 5.5 feet (1.67 meters) to 22 feet (6.7 meters) to rocks found on the loose “rubble-pile” asteroids Itokawa, Ryuguand Determine.
They found similarities between the morphology of the rocks of all of these asteroids and suggested to Robin and colleagues a common formation and evolution mechanism.
The teams’ results build a detailed picture of the Didymos system as it was before the impact of the DART on Dimorphos. The findings could help inform the upcoming Hera mission from the European Space Agency (ESA).
Set to launch in October this year, Hera will meet Didymos and Dimorphos in September 2026. One at the Didymous binary system, Hera, will capture higher-resolution data that allows for a more comprehensive examination of the system as it is after the DART impact. This should help scientists better determine the aftermath of DART’s collision with Dimorphos.
Join our Space Forums to keep talking space on the latest missions, night sky and more! And if you have a news tip, correction or comment, let us know at: [email protected].
Robert Lea is a science journalist in the U.K. whose articles have been published in Physics World, New Scientist, Astronomy Magazine, All About Space, Newsweek and ZME Science. He also writes about science communication for Elsevier and the European Journal of Physics. Rob holds a bachelor of science degree in physics and astronomy from the U.K.’s Open University. Follow him on Twitter @sciencef1rst.
When NASA’s Lucy mission passed by the end to-Earth asteroid Dinkinesh final November, it learned that Dinkinesh had a companion — a bit of moonlet that astronomers quickly named Selam. And now, scientists possess measured Selam’s age. Their estimate suggests that little Selam separated from its elevated accomplice Dinkinesh simply 2 to 3 million years ago, making Selam a toddler — by characterize voltaic draw standards, pointless to snarl.
“Finding the ages of asteroids is mandatory to belief them, and this one is remarkably younger when when put next with the age of the characterize voltaic draw, that method it formed a bit of no longer too lengthy ago,” Colby Merrilla doctoral student at Cornell College, said in a yell.
Straight away after Lucy learned Selam, Merrill and his colleagues position about investigating the newly learned asteroid’s dynamics and started constructing a mannequin of how Selam orbits Dinkinesh. It appeared probably that Selam consisted of loosely packed particles ejected from Dinkinesh; assuming this foundation, the employees could presumably utilize this sort of mannequin to estimate the asteroid’s age.
Historically, astronomers date an asteroid by counting the sequence of impact craters that pockmark its flooring; the more craters, the longer that an asteroid has been spherical to get those impacts. However Merrill and his colleagues frail a particular manner. They simulated Selam forming from Dinkinesh under a spread of totally different starting up prerequisites and waited till Selam reached the orbit that Lucy glimpsed final November.
The crew simulated 1 million conditions that resulted in a Selam-love body forming. The median scenario dated Selam as 3 million years outdated, whereas essentially the most frequent end result was as soon as closer to 2 million. If either of those figures are simply, Selam could presumably additionally very effectively be younger than Lucy’s namesakethe three.2-million-twelve months outdated human ancestor Australopithecus afarensis learned in Ethiopia in the Seventies.
This identical manner could presumably support date other asteroid binary systems going ahead. Dinkinesh is amongst the estimated 15 p.c of end to-Earth asteroids which possess binary partners. “Acquiring the age of this one body can aid us to worship the inhabitants as a complete,” Merrill said in the identical yell.
Breaking residence facts, essentially the most modern updates on rocket launches, skywatching occasions and more!
As for Lucy itself, it has easiest begun its chronicle tour of the characterize voltaic draw. The next asteroid on its itinerary, situated between Mars and Jupiteris 52246 Donaldjohanson, which Lucy will crawl to in 2025. Then, between 2027 and 2033, Lucy will hover previous eight Trojan asteroids, bodies that share Jupiter’s orbit spherical the solar
Be part of our House Forums to connect talking residence on essentially the most modern missions, evening sky and more! And whereas that you just can additionally possess a facts tip, correction or comment, permit us to know at: [email protected].
Rahul Rao is a graduate of Contemporary York College’s SHERP and a contract science writer, assuredly holding physics, residence, and infrastructure. His work has appeared in Gizmodo, Standard Science, Inverse, IEEE Spectrum, and Continuum. He enjoys driving trains for fun, and he has viewed every surviving episode of Doctor Who. He holds a masters level in science writing from Contemporary York College’s Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program (SHERP) and earned a bachelors level from Vanderbilt College, where he studied English and physics.
