By- Srushti sharma
A teaspoon’s worth of dark dust and granules scooped from an asteroid 200m miles from Earth has arrived at the Natural History Museum in London,
Researchers at the museum received 100mg of the pristine material, which at 4.6bn years old dates back to the dawn of the solar system
Nasa’s Osiris-Rex mission stopped at asteroid Bennu in 2020 and returned samples to Earth in September.
The spacecraft briefly touched down on Bennu, an asteroid that has a 1-in-1,750 chance of colliding with Earth in the next 300 years
Bennu gathered more than 60g of untouched material, the largest amount brought back from space since the Apollo program.
Preliminary analyses by NASA researchers found that chunks of the asteroid were rich in carbon and water, with some of the carbon tied up in organic compounds.
Scientists expect to study the samples for decades as they seek to understand how the solar system formed
One key area of research will be to analyse hydrogen isotopes in the water bound up in Bennu to see if any of it matches that found in Earth’s oceans.
Beyond the questions of our cosmic origins are more existential matters, such as how to deflect or destroy asteroids that pose a potential threat to Earth.
The first two years of research at the Natural History Museum will focus on non-destructive tests, such as X-ray diffraction and electron