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Shortly after the Japanese probe Hayabusa2 returned to Earth, JAXA displayed some of the samples it collected from the asteroid Ryugu. Those rocks come from chamber “A” of the probe’s sample capsule, meaning they were collected during the mission’s first landing in February 2019. Now, JAXA has released Photographs showing the contents of chamber “C” of the capsule, which opened on December 21.
We have not yet confirmed the origin of the artificial object (人工 物). A projectile was used during sample collection and it is possible that this was aluminum separated from the sampler horn at that time.
– HAYABUSA2 @ JAXA (@ haya2e_jaxa) Dec 24, 2020
In JAXA’s tweet, it said that the agency opened both cameras “B” and “C”. Chamber “B” is empty as it was not used for collection, but chamber “C” was used to collect samples during Hayabusa2’s second landing in July 2019. JAXA fired an explosive at the asteroid prior to the second landing to create a crater and be able to collect samples from deeper subsoils. Scientists hope that subsurface samples may offer more clues about the formation and early period of the solar system, since they had not been exposed to the hash environment of space.
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