NASA's Lucy spacecraft efficiently completes 1st flyby of asteroid 'Dinky'

On Nov. 1, NASA confirmed its Lucy spacecraft efficiently accomplished a flyby of asteroid Dinkinesh, a comparatively small area rock positioned in the primary belt between Mars and Jupiter. This marks a milestone in Lucy’s journey, as Dinkinesh, or ‘Dinky,’ is the primary of 10 asteroids the probe will go to over the subsequent 12 years.

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“Based mostly on the knowledge obtained, the staff has decided that the spacecraft is in good well being,” NASA officers wrote in a blog post after the flyby occurred. “The staff has commanded the spacecraft to begin downlinking the info collected throughout the encounter.”

In a nutshell, the Lucy mission is a part of NASA’s formidable endeavor to unveil secrets and techniques of our photo voltaic system’s previous. Although Lucy may even be passing by a couple of comparatively close by asteroids like Dinky, the probe’s major aim is to fly by a couple of extra distant Trojan asteroids orbiting the solar alongside Jupiter like bundles of pebbles certain to the gravitational tides of a large boulder. Scientists are fascinated about studying extra about these Trojans as a result of they’re believed to be historical relics of the photo voltaic system, like additional Lego bricks from the field that constructed the planets.

Associated: NASA’s LUCY mission snaps its asteroid targets for the first time

An illustration of NASA's Lucy spacecraft as it approaches the asteroid Dinkinesh. — An illustration of NASA’s Lucy spacecraft as it approaches the asteroid Dinkinesh. (Image credit: Robert Lea/NASA)

Lucy’s flyby of Dinkinesh will be considered a test-run on this regard, as most of the spacecraft’s devices have now been oiled whereas amassing knowledge about this primary asteroid encounter — together with a shade imager, high-resolution digital camera and infrared spectrometer.

In keeping with the weblog publish, knowledge from these instruments will take a couple of week to be downlinked to Earth, and the staff is “wanting ahead to seeing how the spacecraft carried out throughout this primary in-flight take a look at of a high-speed asteroid encounter.”

An animation showing two black and white images side-by-side. The right image has a yellow circle around the dot that is moving across the screen in both images.

The yellow circle represents Dinkinesh. This is a visual Lucy snagged of the asteroid far prior to the approach. (Image credit: NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL)

Subsequent, Lucy will head again to Earth for a gravity help that’ll assist it zoom towards its second asteroid goal: 52246 Donaldjohanson — named after co-discoverer of the Lucy fossil (consultant of 1 the earliest human ancestors, for which the spacecraft is called), American paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson. And if you happen to had been questioning, “Dinkinesh” is simply one other title for the Lucy fossil.

It additionally means “you might be marvelous,” as you might be, Lucy.

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