The space agency TOKYO-Japan claims to have discovered far more black debris than on the asteroid Ryugu, confirming the success of its Hayabusa2 mission, nine days after delivering its payload to the Australian bush.
Scientists plan to study materials that would have preserved the chemical composition of the primitive solar system some 4.6 billion years ago to find clues about the origin of life on Earth.
The Hayabusa-2 mission was launched in 2014. He took samples from the surface of Ryugu and from an artificial crater on the asteroid created by the explosion of a projectile.
It was so far beyond our expectations that we almost ran out of words.
– Hirotaka Sawada, JAXA scientist.
After travelling more than 3.2 billion miles, Hayabusa 2 flew over the earth earlier this month and dropped a capsule of samples. The capsule produced a flaming tail when it plunged into the atmosphere, and after the parachute had deployed on the 6th. December has landed in Australia.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) hopes to collect at least 0.1 grams of material, the equivalent of several grains of rice. But at first he couldn’t be sure if there was anything in the capsule or if there was a leak during the descent.
On Tuesday, after the capsule returned to Japan, JAXA scientists opened a room where samples of the Ryugu’s surface should be found. They were in for a surprise.
The monster was successfully recovered after being dropped to Earth by the Hayabusa2 spaceship.
Photo:
Handout / Agence France-Presse / Getty Images
It was so far beyond our expectations that we almost ran out of words. It was very moving, said the JAXA scientist.
Hirotaka Sawada,
who was present at the opening. They weren’t just small, powdery particles. These were crumbly specimens of a few millimeters in size.
He went on to say: We were able to obtain a quantity that far exceeded our expectations, although he refused to estimate the weight of the material.
JAXA scientists said that the capsule remained tightly sealed and that the crumbly dirt was confirmed as coming from the carbon-rich Ryugu, as suggested by its black colour. They stated that they also protected the gases emitted by the material of the asteroid in what they described as the first sample of extraterrestrial gas taken by humans.
A theory about the origin of life on earth is that amino acids, the building blocks of life, were brought to earth by asteroids or meteorites. Mud and gas samples from Ryugu can help prove this theory.
The capsule landed with a parachute in Australia.
Photo:
Handout / Agence France-Presse / Getty Images
Email Peter Landers at peter.landers@wsj.com.
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