Japanese probe searches asteroid of human beings – Technology



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After sending the Hayabusa (Peregrine Falcon) probe in 2003 to encounter an asteroid, having even been able to collect small soil samples and return to Earth, now wants to repeat the feat through the second version of the probe, at Hayabusa2.

Apollo asteroids are a group of asteroids whose orbits are close to that of the Earth. These rocky objects were named after the discovery of the 1862 Apollo asteroid by Karl Wilhelm Reinmuth, the first asteroid discovered from this group.

The new Japanese spacecraft was traveling for more than three years through the solar system, having arrived, on June 27, to the fate that has been proposed: the Ryugu asteroid. A small asteroid, discovered in 1999, of an estimated size of 980 meters, belonging to the Apollo class, which circulates around the Earth's orbit.

According to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Hayabusa2 is in orbit around Ryugu, about 20 kilometers away, and will study and collect material over the next 18 months, bringing it back to Earth .

Ryugu Asteroid. A spatial and potentially human sugar

The Haybusa2 spacecraft has three levels for sampling. The maneuvers will also be used to install four small probes that will further explore the surface of the Ryugu.

Ribose is a unique sugar composed of five carbon molecules, which occurs naturally in all living cells and forms the carbohydrate portion of DNA. Ribose is also the sugar that initiates the metabolic process for the production of ATP, the main source of energy used by cells, especially muscle cells. Very similar to creatine.

Scientists hope that with the analysis of the ancient and rich carbon rock of the asteroid Ryugu, they will be able to get a new insight into the composition of the early solar system and the origins of life.

Samples can help confirm if asteroids carry an essential chemical component in human cells, which is a simple sugar called ribose.

If this presence is confirmed, this existing chemical on Earth and in humans could even have come from other parts of the space, rather than forming here alone.

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