United States: NASA’s Lucy spacecraft has discovered that the asteroid Dinkinesh has a mini-moon.
The discovery was made during a flyby of Dinkinesh, 300 million miles (480 million kilometers) away in the main asteroid belt beyond Mars. The spacecraft took a picture of the pair when it was about 270 miles out (435 kilometers).
NASA sent the Lucy spacecraft past Dinkinesh as a practice run for studying larger and more enigmatic asteroids located around Jupiter. The spacecraft aims to investigate these asteroids to gain insights into the formation of the solar system and the origins of the planets.
According to the report, over its 12-year mission, it will examine two asteroids in the main asteroid belt and nine Trojans.
Since some of the planets in the inner Solar System, like the rocky ones, are believed to have originated from the accumulation and merging of smaller rocks, discovering more binary asteroids like Dinkinesh could enhance our understanding of this formation process.
The bigger rock, as initial measurements indicate, is approximately 790 meters (2,600 feet) across at its widest point, while the smaller one is comparatively small, measuring about 220 meters (720 feet).
It will take some additional time to complete the extraction of the remaining Dinkinesh data from Lucy. This data will not only provide information about the asteroid but also offer insights into Lucy’s performance.
Meanwhile, the spacecraft is en route to its next main belt encounter, the asteroid DonaldJohnson, and this rendezvous is scheduled for 2025.
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