The National China Space Administration shared the first image of its Tianwen-2 probe, which is on the way to Kamo’oalewa, in an asteroid near the earth.
The image was captured by a camera sham The probe, which is currently more than 3 million kilometers from the earth, and shows one of its wings with its solar panels deployed. It is also the first overview that the CNSA offered its space probe, which was launched on May 29 on a long rocket of March 3 of the Xichang satellite launch center in Zeyuan Town, China. The design of Tianwen-2 panels is apparently similar to those of Lucy, the NASA space probe which explores asteroids floating near Jupiter. These are used to respond to the requests for electricity required for the trip.
The mission of Tianwen-2 is to land on the surface of Kamo’oalewa, to collect samples and to return to earth. The spacecraft should land on the surface of the asteroid in July 2026. Before that, it will spend several months study Kamo’oalewa at a safety distance, to determine its sampling area, before carrying out landing maneuvers, a difficult particle task given the low gravity of the asteroid.
Once the samples have been taken, Tianwen-2 returns to earth and will send his samples to the surface of the capsules, before the acts to use the gravity of the earth as a sling to go around 311p / Panstarrs, an unusual asteroid of Mars which has characteristics of a comet, including visible tails. Tianwen-2 should carry out this mission until 2035.
The enigma of Hawaii almost moon
Kamo’oalewa is one of the seven known to the earth almost—Objects that what is in orbit around our planet, but which are not actually linked to the earth, and the news asteroids create the sun in an orbit similar to that of the earth.
Discovered in 2016 by astronomers from the Haleakala Observatory in Hawaii, Kamo’oalewa – whose name means “celestial object oscillating” in Hawaiian – is around 4.65 million kilometers from our planet, 12 times further from the earth than the Moon. Kamo’oalewa is estimated at around 40 to 100 meters in diameter, maintained its current orbit for 100 years and will probably keep it for 300 others.
We hope that Tianwen-2 will be able to solve the mystery of the origin of Kamo’oalewa. A theory It is that it is a piece of rock that broke out of the moon of the moon of the years August.
Evidence and modeling suggest that Kamo’oalewa has benbit the sun for millions of years, although with an unattractive trajectory. A direct exploration of this asteroid could, moreover, develop knowledge on nearby celestial objects which could potentize the threret on earth.
This story initially looked at Cable EN ESPAñol and was translated from Spanish.
