An asteroid made of pebbles and rocks is apparently almost indestructible – after all, it is almost as old as the solar system.
Perth – A large part of the asteroids According to experts, they are so-called “rubble piles”. They are made up of numerous smaller chunks of rock that are loosely held together by gravity. In contrast, monolithic asteroids consist of a single rock, how hna.de reported.
A well-known rubble pile asteroid is Itokawa, an asteroid about 500 meters long that was visited in November 2005 by the Japanese Hayabusa 1 spacecraft. In 2010, the space probe brought rock samples to earth – a research team from Curtin University in Perth, Australia, was able to examine three small dust particles and gain important new insights from them.
Rubble pile asteroid is made of rocks and empty space – it’s almost indestructible
The most important finding of the study, the in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences released was allowed to play a major role in research in the future. The researchers found out that the asteroid Itokawa is difficult to destroy and resistant to impacts and collisions. The asteroid, which is about the same size as the iconic Sydney Harbor Bridge, is also correspondingly old: Itokawa is almost as old as the solar system in which it moves.
“The lifetime of a monolithic asteroid the size of Itokawa in the asteroid belt is estimated at only several hundred thousand years,” explains the study’s lead author, Fred Jourdan of the School of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Curtin University. “Unlike monoliths, Iokawa isn’t a single lump of rock, but is made up of loose rocks and rocks — almost half of the asteroid is empty space,” Jourdan continues.
Asteroid Itokawa is “like a giant space cushion” and almost indestructible
The researcher is convinced that a large impact at least 4.2 billion years ago hit the monolithic mother asteroid and created Itokawa. “The surprisingly long survival time of an asteroid the size of Itokawa is attributed to the shock-absorbing effect of the material in the debris piles,” explains the scientist. “In short, we found that Itokawa is like a giant space cushion and very difficult to destroy.”
Until now it was not clear how long-lived rubble pile asteroids are – which is why it is difficult to develop defense strategies for such asteroids. The US space agency Nasa recently tested as part of the “DART” missionwhether a spacecraft impact can throw an asteroid off course. In order to develop such plans for “rubble pile” asteroids, researchers first have to find out more about them.
“rubble pile” asteroid is almost as old as the solar system
“We wanted to find out whether ‘rubble pile’ asteroids are resistant to shaking, or whether they will break up at the slightest touch,” explains study co-author Nick Timms in one Message. “Now that we’ve established that they can survive almost the entire history of the solar system, they must be more common in the asteroid belt than previously thought, making it more likely that a large asteroid hurtling toward Earth would cause a ‘rubble pile ‘-asteroid will be.”
But what do the researchers do with this new knowledge? “The good news is that we can use this information to our advantage,” emphasizes Timms and continues: “If an asteroid is discovered too late for a kinetic collision, we can potentially take a more aggressive approach.” the shock wave of a nuclear explosion that could throw a rubble pile asteroid off course without destroying it. Scientists will work on other ideas and scenarios in the future.
News about asteroids
Just recently Astronomers have discovered a small asteroid, which hit the earth shortly thereafter. It wasn’t the first case of this kind.
So it’s no exaggeration to say that the study of three asteroid dust grains may one day save the world – a claim that the study’s communication also makes right in its headline: “Asteroid finds from space dust could save the planet”. (tab)