On Friday, October 13, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Potfor its acronym in English) launched the mission ‘Psyche‘, aboard a rocket SpaceX Falcon Heavy from the Kennedy Space Center located in Florida, USA.
The ship plans to travel 3.540 million kilometers to a gigantic asteroid rich in metals which orbits in the main asteroid belt of Mars and Jupiter. This distance would mean going to the Moon at least 9,209 times.
It is estimated that the spacecraft will begin orbiting the body until 2029, with the aim of learning the origin of rocky planets such as the Land.
(You may be interested: Bill Gates wants to compete with Elon Musk and ‘SpaceX’: he invested in a rocket company).
This is the first mission that the Pot performs in the direction of a metallic asteroid Of the solar system. The event occurred at 11:19 (Local time) from platform 39A at the Kennedy Space Center and was documented thanks to a live broadcast.
We have visited gaseous and rocky planets, icy moons, comets and rocky asteroids for more than 60 years, but we had never seen a metallic asteroid.
According to Jim Bell, a professor at Arizona State University, it would be the only metal-rich asteroid identified and, so far, the largest with these characteristics.
“We have visited for more than 60 years, with NASA and other agencies, gaseous and rocky planets, icy moons, comets and rocky asteroidsbut we had never seen a metallic asteroid,” Bell said in the broadcast.
(We recommend you read: NASA reveals that samples from the asteroid Bennu contain carbon and water).
The objective of the project is to find out nature and origin of this intriguing body that orbits the solar system and is composed of valuable metals such as gold, platinum, diamonds, iron and nickel. These minerals would be valued at an amount equivalent to 100,000 times the world economy.
🚀Take off!
At 10:19 am EDT/14:16 UTC, the Psyche spacecraft was launched from launch complex 39A in @NASAKennedy and began its 4 billion kilometer (2.5 billion mile) journey to visit the asteroid Psyche. pic.twitter.com/q8glIeJ2Sg
— NASA in Spanish (@NASA_es) October 13, 2023
Tracy Becker, a planetary scientist at the Southwest Research Institute in Texas, United States, indicated that, according to some estimates, the economic value of the object’s metals could exceed the 10,000 quadrillion dollars. “We have seen other meteorites that are mostly metallic, but what makes this unique Psyche is that it may be made entirely of iron and nickel and other metals,” Becker said.
To date it is estimated that there were an investment of 117 million dollars to do this exploration.
After the metal core was molded inside it, it collided with other bodies that removed the rocky tablecloth leaving the core in place.
The professor from the University of Arizona said that one of the hypotheses about this body is that it could be the ancient and preserved core of a small planet.
“It is believed that the planet began to form in the first moments of the solar system. After the metal core was molded inside, it collided with other bodies that removed the rocky tablecloth leaving the core in place,” explained David Oh, chief of operations engineering at the JET Propulsion Laboratory.
(Also: They find ‘black dust’ when opening the Osiris-Rex probe with an asteroid sample).
This mission, which has the same name as the asteroid, seeks to study the metallic giant since it could give Clues to the origin of rocky or terrestrial surfaces. According to scientists, Psyche may be made up of significant amounts of metal from the core of a planetesimal, which is one of the basic components of our solar system.
Bill Nelson, the director of NASA, commented on how important these missions are for the agency. “Yesterday I was in Houston with the presentation of samples of the asteroid Bennu that the OSIRIS REx mission managed to take and return to Earth and today we have this launch towards another asteroid: Psyche. We are very happy about this new adventure, since we believe that this metallic asteroid was once the core of a planet or moonNelson reported.
What are the characteristics of the asteroid Psyche16?
According to NASA, the asteroid is located in the Kuiper belt, an extensive area of cometary bodies located between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. It is believed to have an irregular shape similar to a dad.
“The asteroid is as wide as the state of Massachusetts and was discovered in 1852 by an Italian astronomer who called it Psyche after the greek goddess of the soul”Jim Bell explained in the live broadcast while holding a scale model of how this celestial body could be observed.
We don’t really know what Psyche is like
Lindy Elkins-Tanton, scientific manager of the mission, pointed out that the object is located in the outer part of the asteroid belt at a distance between 378 million to 497 million kilometers from the Sun, which means that it takes five Earth years to complete an orbit of the well-known star.
“We don’t really know what Psyche is like.”, confessed the researcher. “I often joke that it’s shaped like a potato, because potatoes come in a lot of different shapes, so I’m not wrong.” However, its surface area is known to be 165,800 square kilometers.
The metal body was formed about 4.5 billion years ago at the birth of the solar system and it is possible that it experienced volcanic eruptions, of which remains could remain in the form of lava.
“The best analysis indicates that Psyche is probably made of a mixture of rock and metal, and that metal makes up between 30% and 60% of its volume. The composition of asteroid “has been determined through radar observations and measurements of the asteroid’s thermal inertia (the rate at which an object gains heat),” said the Pot.
What will NASA’s mission be like?
According to information from the agency, the probe sent will remain around the asteroid for approximately two years, in order to study it at different altitudes.
To move, propellers will be used. Hall effectwith engines that use solar panels to obtain ions from a noble gas (xenon gas), which are then accelerated by passing through an electric field.
The velocity generated is five times faster than conventional rocket fuel.. According to NASA, three instruments will be used in the study: generators of multispectral images to photograph it, spectrometers to determine its composition and magnetometers to measure its magnetic field.
Laura Nathalia Quintero Ariza
School of Multimedia Journalism EL TIEMPO
LATEST NEWS EDITORIAL.
Read more news…
#NASA #launches #Psyche #mission #asteroid #valued #thousand #quadrillion #dollars