His primary goal Artemis 1 The mission is the first comprehensive test of NASA’s new Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. and Orion capsulebut 10 cubic will also take a walk in space. And one of them is headed for one asteroid. The Near-Earth Asteroid Scout (NEA) mission — a joint project between NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) in Huntsville, Alabama, and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California — will see a cube using solar sail to fly to an asteroid, which he will depict in detail. “The genesis of this project was a question: Can we really use a tiny spacecraft to do deep missions and produce useful science at low cost?” Les Johnson, the mission’s principal technology investigator at MSFC, said in a statement (opens in new tab). “This is a huge challenge. For asteroid characterization missions, there simply isn’t enough room on a cubesat for large propulsion systems and the fuel they require.” NEA Scout will travel to asteroid 2020 GE, a small asteroid about 60 feet (18 meters) across that circles the sun once every 368 days. To get to the space rock, the cubesat will pass the moon for a gravity assist, as well as the aforementioned solar sail, which measures 925 square feet (86 square meters).
NEA Scout solar sail packed for launch. (Image: NASA) Solar sails use the power of light particles from The sun as a propellant instead of liquid or solid fuel, which ultimately releases more mass into spacecraft. (The NEA Scout carries special small thrusters to power certain maneuvers as well.) Once NEA Scout reaches the asteroid in 2023, the spacecraft will use its cameras to image the space rock, studying its shape, rotation, debris field and surface features. “NEA Scout will make possibly the slowest flyby of an asteroid ever – with a relative velocity of less than 100 feet [30 meters] per second,” Julie Castillo-Rogez, the mission’s principal science investigator at JPL, said in a statement. “This will give us a few hours to gather invaluable science and allow us to see what asteroids in this class look like from close.”
The NEA Scout solar sail was developed. (Image: NASA) The mission will mark the first time scientists have studied in detail any member of the smallest class of asteroids, 330 feet (100 meters) in diameter or smaller, which “will help close gaps in knowledge about near-Earth asteroids.” according to NASA. And scientists have two motivations for closing such gaps. First, asteroids represent remnants of planet formation, so they can shed light on the history of solar systemand of course there is the ever-present possibility of an asteroid colliding with Earth, an event scientists would like to understand well enough to perhaps prevent. Follow Stefanie Waldek on Twitter @StefanieWaldek. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and up Facebook.
