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A tiny sherd from themost unsafe asteroid in the solar systemhas arrive in the U.K. — and scientists think it could teach us about the origins of life on Earth .
The shard — a millimetre - size ( 0.04 inch ) slice from the roughly 6 - apothecaries' ounce ( 170 grams ) sample that was collect from the asteroid Bennu and may contain the precursors to life — get at the Natural History Museum in London Tuesday ( Nov. 28 ) .
The sample sent to the UK’s Natural History Museum is just a small slice of the regolith collected from Bennu.
NASAscientists first bring out the sample distribution on Oct. 11 after it hurl back to Earthaboard the OSIRIS - male monarch capsuleat speeds of up to 27,000 mph ( 43,000 km / h ) . After a seven - year , 4 billion - land mile ( 6.4 billion kilometer ) round tripper , the capsule deployed its parachute and safely landed in the Utah desert before being enthral to Johnson Space Center in Houston . Now , act of it are being mail around the world for analysis .
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" It ’s almost unbelievably exciting,“Sara Russell , a prof of cosmic mineralogy and wandering science at the Natural History Museum , enjoin in a statement . " It ’s almost like a dream to have the sample back , because we ’ve been suppose about it for so long . "
OSIRIS-REx’s view of asteroid Bennu
Bennu is apotentially wild asteroidthat has a 1 - in-2,700 prospect of impinge on Earth in the year 2182 — the highest odds of any have sex blank space objective . But the scientist are more interested in what ’s trammel inside the space John Rock : the potential extraterrestrial forerunner of life on Earth .
" This is the biggest carbon - rich asteroid sample ever returned to Earth , " NASA AdministratorBill Nelsonsaid ata news conferenceupon the sample distribution ’s return . " carbon copy and water supply molecules are exactly the element we wanted to chance . They ’re important elements in the formation of our own planet , and they ’re going to help us determine the origins of elements that could have led to life . "
Earth ’s water supply is older than the satellite itself and was probably brought here by asteroid andcomet impacts . But water likely was n’t the only material asteroid brought to Earth ; the construction block of life likely hitched a ride on a space rock , too . Bennu is a bacillus - case asteroid , which stand for it contains gamy amounts ofcarbonand , potentially , many of the primordial atom present when life emerged on Earth .
Some of these building pulley block — including uracil , one of the nucleobases forRNA — were recentlyfound on the asteroid Ryuguby the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency ’s Hayabusa2 ballistic capsule , which deliver to Earth with its rock sample distribution in 2020 . OSIRIS - king mission scientist are hope to find other potential precursors for Earth ’s biological science inside the Bennu sample .
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The sampling was collectedafter nearly two year of searchingfor a landing place situation on Bennu ’s craggy surface . Upon making contact with the asteroid , OSIRIS - REx fired a burst of nitrogen from its Touch - and - Go Sample - Acquisition Mechanism to both stick the landing place and forestall the craft from sinking through the asteroid .
The blast sent rocks and dust careening around the craft , and some of that rough debris land in a canister aboard OSIRIS - REx . A follow - up blast of OSIRIS - REx ’s thrusters by and by lifted it from Bennu , and the spacecraft completed a number of flyover before lead the asteroid for Earth in May 2021 .
Now that the sampling has arrived , scientists around the world will commence analyzing it for clues about how oursolar system , and the life on our planet , came to be .
" It ’s kind of like the remnant construction pulley-block of our solar system,“Ashley King , a meteorite researcher at the Natural History Museum , said in the statement . " When we opine about how planet Earth formed , all the ingredient are also locked up within Bennu . So we want to disentangle the storey of Bennu and hear about the origin of the solar system and then the history of Earth . "
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