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☆ NASA Lucy mission: A space rock got a moon after sun-driven quake
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-31 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

CNN —Astronomers were in for a surprise when NASA’s Lucy mission flew by an asteroid named Dinkinesh in November and spotted a contact binary — two smaller space rocks that touch each other — orbiting the asteroid like a moon. “Basically, the planets formed when zillions of smaller objects orbiting the Sun, like asteroids, ran into each other. The Lucy mission captured additional imagery revealing that the asteroid Dinkinesh’s moon is actually two space rocks that are touching one another. Too distant to be seen in detail with telescopes, the asteroids will get their close-up when Lucy reaches the Trojans in 2027. The mission borrows its name from the Lucy fossil, the remains of an ancient human ancestor discovered in Ethiopia in 1974.

Persons: NASA’s Lucy, Dinky ”, ”, Hal Levison, Lucy, Dinkinesh, Goddard, Johns Hopkins, Keith Noll, Jessica Sunshine, ” Levison, Sunshine, Selam, “ I’m, “, NASA Galileo, Ida, Lucy’s, NASA Lucy, ” Sunshine, Dinky Organizations: CNN —, Southwest Research, NASA, Goddard Space Flight, University of Maryland, College Locations: Boulder , Colorado, Greenbelt , Maryland, Dinkinesh, Ethiopia, Jupiter

☆ Asteroid visited by NASA spacecraft has a ‘puzzling’ companion
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-08 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —Dinkinesh, a small asteroid that NASA’s Lucy mission visited last week, continues to surprise. At first, images suggested that the space rock was part of a binary pair, with a smaller asteroid orbiting Dinkinesh. The first image taken by the spacecraft during its closest approach revealed the companion, but not the fact that it was a contact binary. “Contact binaries seem to be fairly common in the solar system,” said John Spencer, Lucy deputy project scientist at the Southwest Research Institute, in a statement. The skeleton has helped researchers piece together aspects of human evolution, and NASA Lucy team members hope their mission will achieve a similar feat regarding the history of our solar system.

Persons: CNN —, Lucy, Goddard, Johns Hopkins, ”, John Spencer, we’ve, We’d, Hal Levison, “, Tom Statler, NASA Lucy Organizations: CNN, NASA, Southwest Research Institute, Dinkinesh, Trojans Locations: Ethiopia, Jupiter

☆ NASA mission captures image of surprising asteroid pair
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-03 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —When NASA’s Lucy mission flew by its first asteroid this week, its cameras captured a surprise. The Lucy spacecraft zoomed by the small asteroid Dinkinesh, located in our solar system’s main asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. (Lockheed Martin is a NASA partner on the Lucy mission.) Preparing for future flybysThe data collected during the Lucy mission flyby will continue to return to Earth over the next week. There are about 7,000 Trojan asteroids, and the largest is 160 miles (257 kilometers) across.

Persons: Lucy, Hal Levison, “, ” Levison, we’ve, ”, Tom Kennedy, Lockheed Martin, ” Kennedy, Keith Noll, NASA’s, Lucy’s, NASA Lucy Organizations: CNN, Southwest Research Institute, ”, Lockheed, NASA, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Locations: Ethiopia, Greenbelt , Maryland, Jupiter

☆ NASA’s Lucy mission will closely fly by the asteroid Dinkinesh
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-01 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

CNN —The NASA Lucy mission is about to have its first encounter with a space rock. The spacecraft, launched in October 2021, will fly by the small asteroid Dinkinesh on Wednesday. Dinkinesh is about half a mile (1 kilometer) wide and is situated in the main asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Each of the asteroids Lucy will fly by differ in size and color. These are some of the asteroids that the Lucy mission will fly by over the next 12 years.

Persons: NASA Lucy, Lucy, ”, Hal Levison, Dinkinesh, REx — Lucy, Mark Effertz, Amy Mainzer, — Organizations: CNN, NASA, Lincoln, Asteroid Research, US Air Force, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Southwest Research Institute, Dinkinesh, JPL, Caltech, Lockheed Martin, University of Arizona, Trojans Locations: LINEAR, San Antonio, Jupiter, Littleton , Colorado, Ethiopia

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