First look at Ryugu samples
Japanese scientists have taken their first look at the Ryugu sample material brought back by Hayabusa-2 and found they resemble charcoal.
The samples Japanese space officials described Thursday are as big as 1 centimeter (0.4 inch) and rock hard, not breaking when picked up or poured into another container. Smaller black, sandy granules the spacecraft collected and returned separately were described last week.
…The sandy granules the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency described last week were from the spacecraft’s first touchdown in April 2019.
The larger fragments were from the compartment allocated for the second touchdown on Ryugu, said Tomohiro Usui, space materials scientist. To get the second set of samples in July last year, Hayabusa2 dropped an impactor to blast below the asteroid’s surface, collecting material from the crafter so it would be unaffected by space radiation and other environmental factors.
Usui said the size differences suggest different hardness of the bedrock on the asteroid. “One possibility is that the place of the second touchdown was a hard bedrock and larger particles broke and entered the compartment.”
The analysis of these samples has only just begun. Dating them is likely next, and that will probably reveal some startling results.
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Japanese scientists have taken their first look at the Ryugu sample material brought back by Hayabusa-2 and found they resemble charcoal.
The samples Japanese space officials described Thursday are as big as 1 centimeter (0.4 inch) and rock hard, not breaking when picked up or poured into another container. Smaller black, sandy granules the spacecraft collected and returned separately were described last week.
…The sandy granules the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency described last week were from the spacecraft’s first touchdown in April 2019.
The larger fragments were from the compartment allocated for the second touchdown on Ryugu, said Tomohiro Usui, space materials scientist. To get the second set of samples in July last year, Hayabusa2 dropped an impactor to blast below the asteroid’s surface, collecting material from the crafter so it would be unaffected by space radiation and other environmental factors.
Usui said the size differences suggest different hardness of the bedrock on the asteroid. “One possibility is that the place of the second touchdown was a hard bedrock and larger particles broke and entered the compartment.”
The analysis of these samples has only just begun. Dating them is likely next, and that will probably reveal some startling results.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
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c/o Robert Zimmerman
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Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Fascinating. Congratulations to Japan on a great technological and scientific achievement.
America’s first space station Skylab also landed in Australia in its uncontrolled 1979 crash. At the time one NASA official caused an international kerfuffle when he said that Australia was as good a place as any for it to crash because there were only kangaroos there.
The Aussies had a great sense of humor about it. One of them sold t-shirts with a target on them and said the U.S. government couldn’t do anything right so wearing a target would ensure your safety.
This archived NY Times article mentions the NASA comment:
https://www.nytimes.com/1979/07/13/archives/australians-search-for-souvenirs-of-skylab-visitors-to-cattle.html
why would the age of the Ryugu material be expected to be anything different for that of Earth? The Earth and Ryugu having both been formed from the same dust cloud that became our solar system?
But then the dust cloud that became the solar system would not have originated from a single super nova star. Would have to be multiple dust clouds, with the solar system finally forming when enough dust clouds had merged to provide a critical mass to collapse into the Sun? Sure seems speculative.
Steve Richter: Think of the epochs and eons on Earth. These different layers have different ages, because they formed at different times. Once laid out in sequence they tell you much about the geological history of their location.
One asteroid is likely only going to give a single age, though it is not impossible for there to be rocks from many places with different ages each. Accumulate data from enough asteroids, correlate that with their orbital history, and you can begin to map out their sequence of formation, which will then begin to give you the sequence of formation of the solar system, in its early days.
I own a couple of meteorites, one iron and one carbonaceous chondrite (think rock), and they are dramatically different. All the missions so far have or are visiting rubble piles which are made up of mostly rock. I would be very interested in a visit to an iron asteroid. Certainly no guarantee of a sample return, but a good look at one would be useful from a planetary defence perspective. I would rather have a rubble pile heading towards me than a solid lump of metal!
@Steve Richter, as Bob says, the diversity of types of astroids give different insights into the stuff that makes up our solar system. The fact that there are solid metal ones means there was once at least one body that was big enough for the heavy elements to sink to its core. This also means it had a differentiated outer layer, before presumably getting smashed into bits at some point. ( Unless it was the Vogons!)
So every data point from different astroids gives a different window into the evolution of the solar system… And the fact that most asteroids live between Mars and Jupiter can not be a coincidence, but as far as I know there is no consensus so far as to why. ( I personally blame the Vogons… It’s a Hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy reference, essential reading for fans of comedy sci-fi!)
Lee Stevenson: In case you are unaware, there is one mission, dubbed Psyche, that is heading to Psyche, a metal asteroid. It is scheduled to launch in ’22 on a Falcon Heavy.
Thank you Bob!!! A double whammy! A mission I have been longing for on my favourite launch vehicle!
I’m now off to Google the mission… Thanks for the tip off! ( I should really pay more attention I guess… Shame on me for missing this one!)
Lee: If you missed Psyche you may also have missed Lucy, which was announced at the same time. It is scheduled to launch in Nov 2021 and visit one main belt asteroid and seven Jupiter trojans. Seems like something you may be interested in.