NASA is poised to send its first spacecraft to study Jupiter's Trojan
asteroids to glean new insights into the solar system's formation 4.5
billion years ago, the space agency said Tuesday.
The probe, called Lucy after an ancient fossil that provided insights into
the evolution of human species, will launch on October 16 from Cape
Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
Its mission is to investigate the group of rocky bodies circling the Sun in
two swarms, one preceding Jupiter in its orbital path and the other trailing
behind it.
After receiving boosts from Earth's gravity, Lucy will embark on a 12-year
journey to eight different asteroids —- one in the Main Belt between Mars
and Jupiter and then seven Trojans.
"Despite the fact that they really are in a very small region of space,
they're very physically different from one another," Hal Levison, the
mission's principal scientist told reporters, about the Trojan asteroids,
which number more than 7,000 in total.
"For example, they have very different colors, some are grey, some are red,"
he added, with the differences indicating how far away from the Sun they
might have formed before assuming their present trajectory.
"Whatever Lucy finds will give us vital clues about the formation of our
solar system," added Lori Glaze, director of NASA's planetary science
division.
Lucy will fly by its target objects within 250 miles (400 kilometers) of
their surfaces, and use its onboard instruments and large antenna to
investigate their geology, including composition, mass, density and volume.
The ship was built by Lockheed Martin and includes over two miles of wire
and solar panels that, placed end-to-end, would be as tall as a five-story
building.
It will be the first solar-powered to venture this far from the Sun, and
will observe more asteroids than any other spacecraft before it. The total
mission cost is $981 million.
The researchers who discovered Lucy the fossil in Ethiopia in 1974 named her
after the Beatles' song "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" which they were
playing loudly at the expedition camp.
In a nod to this heritage, the official logo of the NASA mission is diamond
shaped.
Source: Link
Tags:
Space & Astrophysics