On Nov. 1, NASA confirmed its Lucy spacecraft efficiently accomplished a flyby of asteroid Dinkinesh, a comparatively small area rock situated in the primary belt between Mars and Jupiter. This marks a milestone in Lucy’s journey, as Dinkinesh, or ‘Dinky,’ is the primary of 10 asteroids the probe will go to over the subsequent 12 years.
“Primarily based on the knowledge acquired, the staff has decided that the spacecraft is in good well being,” NASA officers wrote in a weblog submit after the flyby occurred. “The staff has commanded the spacecraft to begin downlinking the information collected throughout the encounter.”
In a nutshell, the Lucy mission is a part of NASA’s bold endeavor to unveil secrets and techniques of our photo voltaic system’s previous. Although Lucy may even be passing by a number of comparatively close by asteroids like Dinky, the probe’s fundamental objective is to fly by a number of extra distant Trojan asteroids orbiting the solar alongside Jupiter like bundles of pebbles certain to the gravitational tides of an enormous boulder. Scientists are occupied with studying extra about these Trojans as a result of they’re believed to be historic relics of the photo voltaic system, like further Lego bricks from the field that constructed the planets.
Associated: NASA’s LUCY mission snaps its asteroid targets for the first time
Lucy’s flyby of Dinkinesh could be regarded as a test-run on this regard, as lots of the spacecraft’s devices have now been oiled whereas amassing knowledge about this primary asteroid encounter — together with a shade imager, high-resolution digicam and infrared spectrometer.
In line with the weblog submit, knowledge from these instruments will take a couple of week to be downlinked to Earth, and the staff is “trying ahead to seeing how the spacecraft carried out throughout this primary in-flight check of a high-speed asteroid encounter.”
Subsequent, Lucy will head again to Earth for a gravity help that’ll assist it zoom towards its second asteroid goal: 52246 Donaldjohanson — named after co-discoverer of the Lucy fossil (consultant of 1 the earliest human ancestors, for which the spacecraft is known as), American paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson. And when you have been questioning, “Dinkinesh” is simply one other title for the Lucy fossil.
It additionally means “you might be marvelous,” as you might be, Lucy.