Asteroids

OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer)
Asteroids
Bennu
Goddard Space Flight Center
Johnson Space Center
Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA)
Planetary Science Division
Science Mission Directorate
NASA will brief media at 11 a.m. EST Wednesday, Jan. 29, to provide an update on science results from NASA’s OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, and Security – Regolith Explorer) mission, which delivered a sample of asteroid Bennu to Earth in September 2023.
Posted January 24, 2025
Asteroids
Earth's Moon
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Planetary Defense
Planetary Defense Coordination Office
Planetary Science
Lee esta historia en español aquí. The near-Earth object was likely ejected into space after an impact thousands of years ago. Now it could contribute new insights to asteroid and lunar science.
Posted January 22, 2025
NASA+
Asteroids
Planetary Defense
Planetary Defense Coordination Office
Planetary Science
Planetary Science Division
Science Mission Directorate
Social Media
NASA is bringing the high-stakes world of planetary defense to the Sundance Film Festival, highlighting its upcoming documentary, “Planetary Defenders,” during a panel ahead of its spring 2025 premiere on the agency’s streaming service.
Posted January 17, 2025
Asteroids
Ames Research Center
Ames Research Center's Science Directorate
General
James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)
Missions
NASA Centers & Facilities
The Solar System
NASA’s powerful James Webb Space Telescope includes asteroids on its list of objects studied and secrets revealed.  A team led by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge repurposed Webb’s observations of a distant star to reveal a population of small asteroids — smaller than astronomers had ever detected orbiting
Posted December 20, 2024
Dawn
Asteroids
Ceres
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Vesta
Known as flow formations, these channels could be etched on bodies that would seem inhospitable to liquid because they are exposed to the extreme vacuum conditions of space. Pocked with craters, the surfaces of many celestial bodies in our solar system provide clear evidence of a 4.6-billion-year battering by meteoroids and other space debris.
Posted December 20, 2024
Comets
Asteroids
The Solar System
These celestial objects look like asteroids but act like comets now come in two flavors. The first dark comet — a celestial object that looks like an asteroid but moves through space like a comet — was reported less than two years ago. Soon after, another six were found. In a new paper, researchers announce […]
Posted December 9, 2024
Johnson Space Center
Asteroids
Astromaterials
Bennu
General
Missions
NASA Centers & Facilities
NASA Directorates
OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer)
Planetary Science
Planetary Science Division
Science & Research
Science Mission Directorate
Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Inst.
The Solar System
As part of an asteroid sample exchange, NASA has transferred to JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) a portion of the asteroid Bennu sample collected by the agency’s OSIRIS-REx mission. The sample was officially handed over by NASA officials during a ceremony on Aug. 22 at JAXA’s Sagamihara, Japan, campus.
Posted August 23, 2024
Asteroids
DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test)
Missions
Planetary Defense
Planetary Defense Coordination Office
Planetary Science
Planetary Science Division
Science Mission Directorate
The Solar System
In studying data collected from NASA’s DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) mission, which in 2022 sent a spacecraft to intentionally collide with the asteroid moonlet Dimorphos, the mission’s science team has discovered new information on the origins of the target binary asteroid system and why the DART spacecraft was so effective in shifting D
Posted July 30, 2024
Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA)
Asteroids
Deep Space Network
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Planetary Defense
Planetary Defense Coordination Office
Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHA)
Space Communications & Navigation Program
The Deep Space Network’s Goldstone planetary radar had a busy few days observing asteroids 2024 MK and 2011 UL21 as they safely passed Earth. Scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California recently tracked two asteroids as they flew by our planet. One turned out to have a little moon orbiting it, while the […]
Posted July 3, 2024
Asteroids
NEA Scout (Near Earth Asteroid Scout)
NEO Surveyor (Near-Earth Object Surveyor Space Telescope)
Planetary Defense
Planetary Defense Coordination Office
Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHA)
The fifth Planetary Defense Interagency Tabletop Exercise focused on an asteroid impact scenario designed by NASA JPL’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies. A large asteroid impacting Earth is highly unlikely for the foreseeable future.
Posted July 2, 2024
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