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Scientists have managed to create what they called the first-ever artificial crater on an asteroid, a step forward to illuminate the evolution of the solar system, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency announced on Thursday.
The announcement comes after the Hayabusa2 probe fired an explosive device on April 5 on the Ryugu asteroid, about 340 million kilometers from the Earth, to blow up a crater on the surface and pick up equipment, in order to reveal more about the origins of life on Earth.
Yuichi Tsuda, head of the Hayabusa2 project, told reporters he confirmed the crater from images captured by the probe located at 1700 meters (5,500 feet) from the surface of the asteroid.
"Creating an artificial crater with an impactor and observing it in detail afterwards is a first global attempt," Tsuda said. "It's a big hit."
NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft successfully created an artificial crater on a comet in 2005, but only for observation purposes.
The JAXA spacecraft photographed the area hit by the projectile at a distance of 1.7 km, according to the news agency, which compared the images of the asteroid surface before and after firing the bullet in metal, and determined the presence of an artificial crater measuring about 10 meters in diameter.
Masahiko Arakawa, a professor from Kobe University involved in the project, said it was "the best day of his life".
"We can see such a big hole much more clearly than expected," he said.
Scientists at JAXA had previously predicted that the crater could reach 10 meters in diameter if the surface was sandy or three meters if it was rocky.
"The surface is filled with blocks but we have yet created a crater of this size. This could mean that there is a scientific mechanism we do not know or something special about Ryugu's materials, "said the professor.
The rocks had been moved and dislodged from their previous location, while there was a dark zone on the surface about 40 meters long, considered as debris created by the impact.
Hayabusa2, who began his descent to the asteroid Wednesday afternoon, captured images of his surface to determine the existence of the crater.
Hayabusa2 fired a copper "impact head" on Ryugu. The agency confirmed a burst of debris caused by the collision.
The purpose of the crater blasting on Ryugu is to create below the surface of the asteroid "fresh" materials that could illuminate the beginnings of the solar system.
It is thought that the asteroid contains relatively large amounts of organic matter and water for about 4.6 billion years, when the solar system is born.
In February, Hayabusa2 briefly approached Ryugu to collect surface samples and discovered hydrated minerals that will help scientists determine whether asteroids have brought water to Earth, according to the hypotheses.
The mission, costing about 30 billion yen, was launched in December 2014 from the Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima Prefecture, and Hayabusa2 reached Ryugu in June. It is planned to return to Earth with its samples in 2020.
The photos of Ryugu – which means "dragon palace" in Japanese and which refers to a castle at the bottom of the ocean in an ancient Japanese tale – show that the asteroid has a rough surface covered with rocks.
Although the original plan was to concentrate the blast within 200 meters of the target, the team reported that it had dropped between 10 and 20 meters.
"The level of accuracy was very high," Tsuda said. "We were able to create a crater in the area we targeted."
The team will continue to analyze the results and determine if there is a suitable area on the Ryugu surface where it can land the space probe to collect a rock sample from the asteroid.
Asteroids like Ryugu are often compared to fossils containing the preserved traces of the birth of the solar system. But the effects of the solar winds altered the surface of Ryugu, which made it necessary to dig deep beneath this surface in order to collect such materials.
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