NASA Probe Lucy Captures Rare Images of Dinkinesh and Contact Binary Satellite

It has been confirmed that Dinkinesh, the first object of observation by the asteroid probe Lucy, has a contact binary as a satellite. Contact binaries are strange celestial bodies in which mass exchange occurs, and the academic world has paid attention to them because they are rarely observed.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) recently released photos of Dinkinesh and its satellite taken by the probe Lucy through its official channel. The image was taken with the high-resolution telephoto camera L’LORRI by Lucy, who was on a flyby (close pass) about 1,630 km away from Dinkinesi around 2 a.m. on the 2nd.

The asteroid on the left of the photo below is Dinkinesh, and the asteroid on the right is Dinkinesh’s satellite, which was first confirmed in this flyby. What is unique is that the satellite has the shape of two objects touching each other.

Asteroid Dinkinesh (left) photographed by Lucy during her flyby. The two small satellites on the right are believed to be contact binaries. <사진=NASA 공식 홈페이지>

In relation to this, a NASA official said, “It seems that Dinkinesh is a contact binary star, that is, carrying two asteroids that have come into contact with each other as satellites. There are not many cases of contact binary stars observed, and it is rare to take such detailed photos.” .

NASA already announced through its official channel on the 2nd that Dinkinesh has a satellite. However, the fact that this satellite is a contact binary was confirmed belatedly with a time lag.

A contact binary refers to a binary star in which the distance between stars is so close that some of their surfaces are glued together or almost merged, sharing the outer gas layer. It is observed in some areas such as Ursa Major, but it is unusual for this feature to be confirmed on a small satellite of an asteroid such as Dinkinesh, which is less than 1 km in diameter.

The Lucy probe observes 11 asteroids in the asteroid belt. <사진=NASA 공식 홈페이지>

NASA added that Lucy has been sending valuable information to Earth since its first exploration. LUCY was developed to look into asteroids in Jupiter’s Trojan group. Jupiter’s Trojan group is one of a group of asteroids that orbit the sun. Among the Lagrange points where the gravity of the Sun and Jupiter and the centrifugal force applied to celestial bodies are balanced, asteroids are distributed around the L4 point (in front of Jupiter as it orbits) and around the L5 point (behind as it orbits Jupiter) in Jupiter’s orbit.

LUCY, launched in October 2021, began full-scale observations this month, two years later. It was planned to sequentially look at 10 asteroids orbiting the asteroid belt for 12 years until 2033, but with the later discovery of Dinkinesh, the number of observation targets increased to 11.

Reporter Jeong Ian [email protected]

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