Hayabusa2 stirs up rubble on surface of Ryugu, pokes asteroid with sampling horn

Japan's Hayabusa2 probe returned to its home position above the asteroid Ryugu today after conducting a second touch-and-go operation. The objective was to collect some pristine rock and dust from Ryugu following a thumping with Hayabusa's explosive impactor earlier this year. The first touch-and-go landing occurred back in …

[Mark 85]

The little space probe that could... and did.

Well done boffins. Very well done. Have one of your choice -------------.>

[jms222]

Suzuki

Only read the article hoping it would contain bike porn.

[oiseau]

Uneasy

A re-entry capsule containing the hard-won fragments will then deliver the cargo through the Earth's atmosphere.

Saw a scary SciFi film not too long ago: Daniel Espinosa's "Life"

Although a bit far fetched in quite a few aspects, it did leave me feeling uneasy for a few days.

I cannot help but to wonder about just how much thought and peer review is actually going into the handling of whatever is brought back from space.

O.

[Long John Brass]

Re: Uneasy

The older documentary "The Andromeda Strain" was also good.

[Christoph]

Re: Uneasy

Anything brought back that tries to escape will immediately be enveloped in an intensely corrosive, poisonous gas which it has never encountered before. It's called 'Oxygen'.

[RayG]

Re: Uneasy

Genuine answer: nowadays, this has been thought about quite a lot. It's not too much of a worry, as the high radiation high vacuum environment of an asteroid is quite hostile to complex organic chemistry. However they also really care about not contaminating the retrieved specimens and destroying their value, so they're likely to put them in a pretty tightly screwed down jar.

I'm more afraid of hostile life forms from the back of my fridge than hostile life forms from Asteroid Ryugu.