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Earlier this month, the Hayabusa2 probe used an explosive device to create an artificial crater on the Ryugu asteroid, but the probe could not stay to confirm its work for fear of being damaged by debris. The Japanese space agency has confirmed the artificial crater, but that's not exactly what it expected.
Earlier in the day, while she was flying at 1,700 meters above the Ryugu asteroid, the Hayabusa2 probe used her optical navigation camera (ONC-T) to confirm the presence of a surprisingly large artificial crater on the surface. Given the rocky makeup of the region, JAXA scientists were expecting something a little smaller. The exercise already tells us something new about this asteroid and about its formation.
On April 5, 2019, Hayabusa2 used an explosive device to blow up a crater on the surface of Ryugu. The images taken by the probe showed the explosive device, the size of a baseball, which slowly descended to the surface. The JAXA, fearing that the probe would be damaged by debris, hid the probe behind the asteroid for about two weeks, while the dust settled slowly into the low gravity environment. Because Hayabusa2 is out of danger, JAXA has not been able to confirm the presence of an artificial crater or its size.
To prove that Hayabusa2 had done his job well, the probe had been overflown by the probe from 23 to 25 April. The images collected by the probe allowed the space agency to confirm the hole. It is "determined that the collision device generated a crater," noted JAXA in a press release. The crater is now confirmed, Hayabusa2 resumes its original position, about 20 km from the surface.
"Creating an artificial crater with an impactor and observing it in detail afterwards is a first global attempt," said Yuichi Tsuda, Hayabusa Project Manager, speaking to reporters earlier in the day, as reported AFP. "It's a big hit."
NASA's Deep Impact projected an artificial crater on comet Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005. The difference in this case is that Hayabusa2 will now try to extract materials inside this new crater, so that Deep Impact could only make observations.
The explosive device of Hayabusa2 should have extracted materials deeper into the asteroid, which will give new information on the formation of asteroids and other celestial objects in the solar system. Earlier in the mission, the probe had picked up material at the top of the asteroid's surface. The probe is expected to return to Earth with its samples – surface and subsoil – by the end of 2020.
On the occasion of the mission and after assessing the target area on the surface, scientists at the JAXA expected an artificial crater of 2 to 3 meters. Unexpectedly, however, the new crater seems to have a width of about 10 meters (almost 33 feet), the total area affected measuring about 20 meters (66 feet) wide. As reported in the AFP report, a loose, sandy surface is expected to produce a crater of this larger size, but the target area was rocky and littered with rocks.
"The exact size and shape of the formed artificial crater will be examined in detail, but it can be seen that the topography of the region of about 20 [meters] broad is changing, "noted JAXA in a tweet. "It was not thought that such an important change would happen, so the project was the subject of lively debate. It seems that we can expect new advances in planetary science. "
Masahiko Arakawa, a professor at Kobe University and working on the project, said that "the surface is filled with blocks, but we have created a crater of this size," AFP reported. "It could mean that there is a scientific mechanism we do not know or anything special about Ryugu's materials."
JAXA will continue to study photos collected by Hayabsua2 over the last two days to learn more about the new crater and refine its estimates. Then, the space agency will order the probe to collect materials inside the crater, which will undoubtedly be a very delicate and precise operation, but potentially facilitated by the unexpected large size of the hole.
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