Earth lives in a shooting gallery, with small and large rocky bodies in abundance in our solar system. Are we in danger of ...

Nearly 400 years ago, Galileo looked at the Pleiades star cluster through his telescope and noticed that the seven or so ...

Meteorites found sitting on the ground are exposed to rain, snow and plants, which can significantly change them and make analysis more difficult. So, the OSIRIS‑REx mission ventured to the ...

The OSIRIS-REx sample containment pod is shown here, shortly after touching down in October 2023. (NASA) "The only way this could be discovered is because of controlled sample return by a ...

Use precise geolocation data and actively scan device characteristics for identification. This is done to store and access ...

A portion of the asteroid Bennu sample delivered to Earth by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, set into a microscope slide at the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. Credit: Molly ...

The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft, launched in 2016, arrived at Bennu in late 2018 and started orbiting the asteroid, which was thought to be a remnant of the solar system’s formation.

This helped OSIRIS-REx to scoop up 121.6 g (4.29 oz), far more than the amount that would have made the mission a success. By returning the sample to Earth, the asteroid's chemical profile was ...

OSIRIS-REx Bennu asteroid samples yield watery history, key molecules for life Clues as to how building blocks of life on Earth may have been seeded.

First off, in comparison to meteorites, which enter Earth's atmosphere while enduring a fiery reentry process before plummeting to the ground, the OSIRIS-REx samples are pristine due to the ...

A top-down view of the OSIRIS-REx Touch-and-Go-Sample-Acquisition-Mechanism (TAGSAM) head with the lid removed, revealing the remainder of the asteroid sample inside.

Short for the Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification and Security Regolith Explorer, OSIRIS-REx was launched in 2016 and briefly touched down on Bennu on Oct. 20, 2020, to ...