The Lucy mission will be the first spacecraft to visit a group of asteroids around Jupiter known as 'the Trojans.'
NASA is expected to launch the $981 million Lucy mission on Saturday, the first in a series of spacecraft that will visit asteroids in the solar system.
"That's what makes the Trojans special. If these ideas of ours are right, they formed throughout the outer solar system and are now at one location where we can go and study them," said Lucy's principal scientist, Hal Levison of Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.The Lucy mission is set to visit the asteroids near Jupiter, which scientists believe were left behind after the formation of the outer planets.
There's nothing better for understanding how our solar system formed 4.6 billion years ago, Levinson said."They're the fossils of planet formation." The asteroid-smacking Dart spacecraft — set to launch Nov. 24 — promises to be a dramatic exercise in planetary defense. If all goes well, the high-speed smashup will occur next fall just 7 million miles away, within full view of ground telescopes.
The spacecraft will be so far from the sun — as much as 530 million miles distant — that massive solar panels are needed to provide enough power. Each of Lucy's twin circular wings stretches 24 feet across, dwarfing the spacecraft tucked in the middle like the body of a moth."Every one of those flybys needs to be near-perfection," Zurbuchen said.
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