The Hayabusa2 Mission was a Japanese space probe launched by JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) on December 3, 2014, aimed at studying the asteroid Ryugu. The mission sought to gather detailed information about the asteroid’s physical and chemical properties, which are believed to hold clues to the early solar system’s formation and the origin of life on Earth. Hayabusa2 successfully landed on Ryugu in June 2018 and collected samples both from its surface and, for the first time, from beneath the asteroid’s surface using a small explosive charge to create a crater. The probe returned to Earth with these samples in December 2020, completing a pioneering six-year round trip and providing significant insights and material for scientific study.
Samples reveal evidence of changes experienced by the surface of asteroid Ryugu, some probably due to micrometeoroid bombardment. Analyzing samples retrieved from the asteroid Ryugu…
A groundbreaking study conducted by a team of international scientists has unveiled unprecedented insights into the nature of the asteroid Ryugu and shed light on…
Samples from the asteroid Ryugu collected by the Hayabusa2 mission contain nitrogenous organic compounds, including the nucleobase uracil, which is a part of RNA. Researchers…
Although it has been nearly two years since Japanese mission Hayabusa2 returned to Earth, samples from asteroid Ryugu are still revealing valuable information about the…
Asteroid Ryugu samples suggest it’s leftover from the formation of the sun billions of years ago. Hayabusa2, an asteroid sample-return mission operated by the Japan…
Brown scientists are analyzing a tiny chunk of the asteroid Ryugu in an effort to better understand the early history of the solar system. In…
On December 10, 2020 (Hawaiʻi Standard Time), the Subaru Telescope imaged the small asteroid 1998 KY26, the target of Hayabusa2’s extended mission. The positional data…
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has confirmed that the gas collected from the sample container inside the re-entry capsule of the asteroid explorer, Hayabusa2,…
Just weeks after NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft made a successful touch-and-go grab of samples from asteroid Bennu, researchers at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston are looking…
On December 6 local time (December 5 in the United States), Japanese spacecraft Hayabusa2 dropped a capsule to the ground of the Australian Outback from…
The team behind ESA’s Hera asteroid mission for planetary defense congratulates JAXA for returning Hayabusa2’s capsule to Earth laden with pristine asteroid samples. They look…
A Japanese space mission will deliver samples collected from asteroid Ryugu in a capsule to the outback desert of Woomera in South Australia this Sunday…
Ryugu’s interaction with the sun changes what we know about asteroid history. In February and July of 2019, the Hayabusa2 spacecraft briefly touched down on…
With Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s recent launch of the Hayabusa2 mission, NASA and other space agencies across the globe are opening up new possibilities for…