COLORADO SPRINGS—NASA has provided new details about the success of the recent Osiris-Rex sample return mission to the asteroid Bennu since gaining access to all the recovered material for the first time in January.
“They brought back a ton of material. The measure of success for this mission was to bring back 60 grams [2.1 oz.] of material and we have accounted over 120 grams,” said Kathleen Vander Kaaden, NASA chief scientist for astromaterials curation within the Science Mission Directorate at the Johnson Space Center (JSC).
Launched in September 2016, the seven-year Osiris-Rex mission dropped off samples gathered from the asteroid—believed to be leftovers from the formation of the Solar System 4.5 billion years ago—for recovery from the Utah Test and Training Range on Sept. 24, 2023.
Although JSC scientists were immediately able to access around 70.3 grams of material found external to the spacecraft’s Touch And Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism (Tagsam), work to disassemble the unit to retrieve the rest of the sample was halted in mid-October after discovering that two of its 35 fasteners could not be removed with the hand tools authorized for use.
NASA finally announced the opening of Tagsam in January after the agency designed and fabricated tools fashioned from a specific grade of surgical, nonmagnetic stainless steel to allow further disassembly without exposing the sample material to terrestrial contamination.
In all, the spacecraft delivered 121.6 grams of material from Bennu. “That’s about the mass of two tennis balls, which might not seem like a lot, but it is a very diverse sample,” said Vander Kaaden. Speaking at the Space Symposium’s Space Science Track, she added that the largest single piece is “a little over 6 grams. The science team has done some 3D renderings to show that there’s another piece of this material in the collection that fits perfectly. So at some point, like during reentry, it must have broken off.”
NASA scientists are impressed by the unexpected differences in size, color, shape and morphology within the collection of material. “This is a really incredible sample that we’re excited to see some science done on,” she added.
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