In September, fragments of a near-Earth asteroid were carefully delivered to the Utah desert. The cosmic rock contains clues about the origins of the solar system and could potentially answer important questions about how our planet formed – if only we can get to them.
Ever since a container containing rocks and dust collected from the asteroid Bennu landed on Earth, NASA has had trouble opening it. The space agency now expects to open a container containing samples of the asteroid sometime in early 2024, as engineers develop new tools that will help open it while preserving the pristine rocks.
The OSIRIS-REx mission was launched in September 2016 and reached the asteroid Bennu in December 2018. The spacecraft captured parts of a small near-Earth asteroid in October 2020 and began its return journey to Earth in May 2021. This was NASA’s first attempt to obtain a sample from an asteroid in space, and the debris from Bennu should have been well preserved for flight.
The asteroid pieces were sealed inside a circular head at the end of an articulated arm that the spacecraft used to grab the sample. Since the container reached Earth, the OSIRIS-REx mission team has had difficulty opening the TAGSAM (Touch-and-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism) head, which stores the bulk of the asteroid sample.
Team members carefully handle TAGSAM through a special hand cabinet under a nitrogen atmosphere to prevent contamination. Two of the 35 fasteners on the TAGSAM head could not be removed using existing tools approved for use in the OSIRIS-REx cabinet, preventing them from removing the sample inside.
The team was able to collect some material from the outside of the TAGSAM head—when the aluminum sample container lid was first removed, team members found black dust and debris on the outside of the container. They also removed some of the material from inside the container using tweezers or a spatula while holding the TAGSAM head valve.
The additional pieces collected so far have exceeded NASA’s goal of collecting 60 grams from Bennu’s surface, so the space agency already has material to work with. In October, NASA showed the public for the first time the samples of the asteroid that had been collected by that time. And the total amount of the asteroid sample is estimated to be 250 grams.
With an additional sample outside of TAGSAM, the $1.16 billion OSIRIS-REx mission has already proven its worth. Scientists conducted a preliminary analysis and found an abundance of carbon and water molecules, supporting the theory that the building blocks of life may have been brought to Earth by asteroids. One can only imagine what else Bennu may have to offer once scientists gain access to the bulk of the material.
Since November, NASA has stopped trying to tinker with the container, but the space agency has not lost hope. Instead, NASA is developing and testing new tools to open the container.
The development, design and testing of new tools made from cleanliness compatible materials is underway to safely complete sample extraction from the TAGSAM head in a perfectly clean cabinet. Depending on production and testing timelines, we expect the container to open in the first quarter of 2024.
Such caution is due to the need to prevent interaction between the Earth’s atmosphere and the samples, so as not to disrupt the purity of the study.
