Analysis of samples brought back to Earth from the asteroid Bennu reveal that it has a bizarre chemical make-up and is ...

In 2018, NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission reached asteroid 101955 Bennu. Two years later, the spacecraft snagged a sample of its surface ... The space rock was "tagged” by OSIRIS-REx mission in ...

it also collected a precious sample of dust and small rocks from Bennu's rubbly surface. In September 2023, a capsule containing the pristine asteroid sample returned to Earth, landing in the Utah ...

Instead, it is loose collection of boulders, rocks, and gravel that all clumped together due to their mutual gravitational pull on each other. If you were able to instantly (and safely) transport ...

Bennu’s rocks formed 4.5 billion years ago on a larger parent asteroid. That asteroid was wet and muddy. Under the surface, pockets of water perhaps only a few feet across were evaporating ...

OSIRIS-REx found that Bennu’s surface was far rougher than thought, and mission controllers spent years finding a spot on Bennu’s where the spacecraft could quickly touchdown and gather samples.

Two new studies examining these extraterrestrial space grains found signs of life’s molecules preserved on the asteroid’s ancient surface. Dust and rocks from Bennu contained all five ...

Mineral rich SEM images of trona (water-bearing sodium carbonate) found in Bennu samples. The needles form a vein through surrounding clay-rich rock, with small pieces of rock resting on top of the ...

Studies of rocks and dust collected from Bennu, an asteroid orbiting Earth, have revealed clues about how life may have first formed on Earth. A NASA mission collected the sample and brought it ...

cold temperature and decreased precipitation at the surface." Senior author of the study Axel Timmermann said: "The likelihood that a Bennu-sized asteroid will strike Earth is quite small at 0.037 ...

Scientists have confirmed the presence of organic molecules on the surface of the near-Earth asteroid Bennu, opening the door to the possibility that life on Earth arose from cosmic origins.