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Another photo was taken during the landing of MASCOT on Ryugu.
Credit: DLR / CNES
Earlier this week, a spacecraft landed a small lander on a diamond-shaped space rock far and wide. Before this robot completed a 17-hour marathon work session, it returned incredible images of its descent.
The lander, called MASCOT, is part of an international mission to explore a primitive asteroid called Ryugu. This is the third robot to venture to the surface of the asteroid. And unsurprisingly, the view from a shoe-size landing gear falling on a rock space is pretty wild.
Look at this! I took this picture when I was almost on #Ryuguthe surface of. Watch how the sunlight reflects on me. What a dark surface!
Credit: MASCOT /@DLR_en /@JAXA_en #AsteroidLanding pic.twitter.com/fqM8Jr0WCm– MASCOT Lander (@ MASCOT2018) October 5, 2018
In a tweet, the team behind the LG explained that the photo includes a weak beam of light reflected by MASCOT.
MASCOT was a joint project of German and French space agencies. It was delivered to the Ryugu asteroid by the Japanese satellite Hayabusa2, which also captured images of the landing. Sewn together in a GIF file, they show the LG that enters through the upper left corner of the frame, then captures the light in the final image.
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く 機 か ら し し し い い く く く く く 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 成功 h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /t.co/E9Mtj88sbC pic.twitter.com/yTDPjxxoBk– 小 惑星 機 (@ haya2_jaxa) October 5, 2018
MASCOT was designed to collect data for 16 hours, about two days from Ryugu. Scientists working on the mission managed to extract an extra hour of work from the robot after realizing that his battery had enough juice to keep running.
Before the power supply was exhausted, MASCOT transmitted all the data collected by its four instruments to the Hayabusa2 satellite, so that this information could be sent back to Earth. Scientists hope the data will help them understand what Ryugu is and how the solar system is formed.
Email Meghan Bartels at [email protected] or follow her. @meghanbartels. follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.
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