asteroids, dart mission, nasa

Early Results From NASA’s DART Mission

Since NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft intentionally slammed into the asteroid moonlet Dimorphos on Sept. 26 — altering its orbit by 33 minutes — the investigation team has been digging into the implications of how this planetary defense technique could be used in the future, if such a need should ever arise. This has included further analysis ...

Troy Oakes

The asteroid Didymos.

DART Spacecraft Prepares to Collide With Asteroid Target Later This Month

As NASA prepares to usher in a new form of planetary defense, one Johns Hopkins engineer will be eagerly awaiting the big collision with an asteroid that she is helping orchestrate. Elena Adams, the mission systems engineer at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, and her team will spend the next two weeks carefully observing Didymos, ...

Troy Oakes

Illustration of NASA’s DART spacecraft and the Italian Space Agency’s LICIACube prior to impact at the Didymos binary system.

How Scientists Are ‘Looking’ Inside Asteroids

Asteroids can pose a threat to life on Earth, but they are also a valuable source of resources to make fuel or water to aid deep space exploration. Devoid of geological and atmospheric processes, these space rocks provide a window into the evolution of the solar system. But to really understand their secrets, scientists must ...

Troy Oakes

An asteroid heading to crash on Earth.