(music throughout) After its discovery in 1999
Our first hints of what asteroid Bennu looked like
came from the Arecibo Observatory.
Then, as the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft made its way to Bennu, the asteroid grew in detail
from a few tiny pixels to a surprisingly rugged world, littered with giant boulders.
OSIRIS-REx arrived at the asteroid on December 3, 2018, and began
surveying the asteroid for the years leading up to the Touch-and-Go sample collection event
The spacecraft discovered boulders the size of buildings,
and imaged the surface down to 5 centimeter per pixel resolution.
While observing Bennu, we made some unexpected discoveries.
OSIRIS-REx spotted pieces of rocky ejecta bursting off Bennu and into space.
The spacecraft was able to observe the entire lifecycle of a natural satellite ejecting off an object,
entering into orbit, and returning back to the surface.
OSIRIS-REx caught a glimpse of a black hole 30,000 light years away.
The discovery was made by an instrument about the size of a shoebox called REXIS
the Regolith X-Ray Imaging Spectrometer.
It detected X-rays radiating from a point off the asteroid’s edge.
OSIRIS-REx has imaged Bennu better than we have Earth and our own Moon.
Using this extremely high-resolution data, we have been able to create
stunning visualizations of the surface of the asteroid.
We used imagery from the Nightingale sample site to created a 360/VR visualization of the rugged terrain.
Using an extensive catalogue of surface imagery, OSIRIS-REx
navigated itself autonomously down to the surface for sample collection.
It used software called Natural Feature Tracking to match up landmarks
with its catalogue to ensure it was on the right track.
Approximately 200 million miles away from Earth,
the spacecraft performed a series of burns to navigate itself to the rocky surface.
At 6:08 pm eastern on October 20, 2020,
OSIRIS-REx successfully tagged sample site Nightingale within one meter of its targeted location
The onboard cameras captured incredible footage of the Touch-and-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism (TAGSAM) contacting the surface.
Imagery from SamCam showed rocks and dust overflowing from the TAGSAM head.
The team is confident they’ve exceeded the mission requirement
of collecting at least 60 grams of material, and on October 29th, 2020, they stowed the sample for return to Earth.
OSIRIS-REx imaged Bennu for the last time on April 7th, 2021
and departed the asteroid on May 10th on its two-year journey to deliver the sample to Earth.