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NASA Invites Media to View Asteroid Sample Recovery Rehearsal
June 8, 2023 -Editor's note: This media advisory was updated Wednesday, June 7, 2023, to correctly reflect the times and dates of the events. NASA invites media to attend the first major asteroid sample recovery rehearsal for its OSIRIS-REx...
NASA Prepares for Historic Asteroid Sample Delivery on Sept. 24
March 24, 2023 -NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is cruising back to Earth with a sample it collected from the rocky surface of asteroid Bennu. When its sample capsule parachutes down into the Utah desert on Sept. 24, OSIRIS-REx will become the United...
First NASA Asteroid Sample Return Mission on Track for Fall ’23 Delivery
October 17, 2022 -NASA's first asteroid sample return spacecraft, OSIRIS-REx, fired its thrusters for 30 seconds on Sept. 21 and nudged its trajectory toward Earth. The resulting course correction keeps the vehicle on track to deliver a sample of asteroid...
Some Asteroids ‘Aged Early’ by Sun, NASA Finds
July 25, 2022 -Scientists from NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission recently learned that surface regeneration happens a lot quicker on asteroids than on Earth. By analyzing rock fractures on asteroid Bennu from high-resolution images taken by the...
NASA Reveals Surface of Asteroid Bennu is Like Plastic Ball Pit
July 8, 2022 -After analyzing data gathered when NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft collected a sample from asteroid Bennu in October 2020, scientists have learned something astonishing: The spacecraft would have sunk into Bennu had it not fired...
NASA Spacecraft Observes Asteroid Bennu’s Boulder “Body Armor”
June 16, 2022 -Asteroid Bennu’s boulder-covered surface gives it protection against small meteoroid impacts, according to observations of craters by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith...
NASA gives green light for OSIRIS-REx spacecraft to visit another asteroid
April 25, 2022 -NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft will swing by Earth to deliver a sample from asteroid Bennu on Sept. 24, 2023. But it won't clock out after that. NASA has extended the University of Arizona-led mission, which will be renamed...
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx Asteroid Sample Return Team Receives 2022 John L. ‘Jack’ Swigert, Jr., Award for Space Exploration
April 5, 2022 -NASA’s OSIRIS-REx asteroid sample return mission team received the 2022 John L. “Jack” Swigert, Jr., Award for Space Exploration by the Space Foundation, a nonprofit organization that advocates for space exploration and...
NASA Mission Helps Solve a Mystery: Why Are Some Asteroid Surfaces Rocky?
October 23, 2021 -Summary: Using data from NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, a University of Arizona-led team of scientists concluded that asteroids with highly porous rocks like Bennu should lack fine-grained material on their surfaces. Scientists thought...
NASA Spacecraft Provides Insight into Asteroid Bennu’s Future Orbit
August 11, 2021 -In a study released Wednesday, NASA researchers used precision-tracking data from the agency’s Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft to better understand movements...