On the morning of Oct. 12, if every thing goes to plan, NASA shall be sending a high-tech spacecraft called Psyche on a 2.2 billion mile journey to an intriguing asteroid by the identical name. Well, to be clear, the asteroid is referred to as 16 Psyche.
The goal of the Psyche mission is to check this space rock in great detail because not only is it believed to be very metal-rich, however it’s also purported to really be the leftover iron core of what once was an entire planet. And potentially, Earth‘s core is manufactured from similar stuff — which implies 16 Psyche could possibly be offering us a direct tunnel to the middle of our world, a spot we cannot otherwise reach.
But before this mission starts falling into place, scientists are using other mechanisms to check the 140-mile-wide space rock. This manner, we’d know what’s in store for NASA‘s craft upon arrival in 2029. In reality, one team from the Southwest Research Institute recently announced some results they gleaned concerning the asteroid. These are results they collected by tapping into two powerful infrared instruments: The presently trailblazing James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the now-retired Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA). Infrared sensors, unlike standard optical sensors, are capable of observe data within the infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum. Light related to this region is, in essence, invisible to the human eye. We will only see a teeny portion of the spectrum referred to as, naturally, the visible region. But for this reason infrared astronomy is so essential — it may help reveal pieces of the universe normally hidden to us and our regular old telescopes.
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Nevertheless, though data from these tools offered a significant-enough lens into 16 Psyche, perhaps probably the most thought-provoking finding was that they each reached a limit.
“All the observations using different techniques keep showing us results that do not make sense in context with one another,” Anicia Arredondo, a postdoctoral researcher on the SwRI and first creator of a paper on the findings, said in a press release. “That is why it is so essential that we now have a mission going there now.”
“With this evaluation and the previous studies of Psyche, we now have reached the limit of what astronomical observations can teach us about this fascinating asteroid,” Maggie McAdam, a NASA Ames research scientist and principal investigator of the brand new study, said in a separate statement.
But they did find something. Type of.
To start, the team observed 16 Psyche in early 2022 with SOFIA — a flying observatory that is essentially a Boeing 747 aircraft carrying a reflective telescope.
SOFIA, which stopped operations that very same yr resulting from its high operating costs, was capable of scan the asteroid within the infrared range because the space rock rotated. In doing so, the telescope gathered information that the scientists say they will use to grasp whether Psyche is the remnant core of a differentiated asteroid — an asteroid that underwent major chemical or physical changes — or a protoplanet.
“In that case,” Arredondo said, “multiple impacts would have stripped all of the outer layers off, leaving only a metal core. But those impacts could also result in variability. Nevertheless, observations indicate that Psyche is metal — no big surprise — and we don’t see plenty of variation with rotation, no less than on the mid-infrared wavelengths.”
In a nutshell, the rationale the team realized Psyche is almost definitely metal is that SOFIA’s spectral data (a graph of various forms of sunshine emitted by the asteroid) did not have any spikes. It also did not have a feature referred to as the 10-micron plateau. These are things that suggest the presence of rock, the team says, equivalent to ground resembling a “fluffy” regolith.
The JWST, alternatively, helped the team determine whether water exists on the asteroid. “Observations across the 3- and 6-micron wavelength ranges tell us whether hydration is present in the shape of hydroxyl or actual water,” Stephanie Jarmack, a research scientist at SwRI and member of the study team, said within the statement — hydroxyl referring to a molecule that consists of 1 oxygen atom and one hydrogen atom.
“If we don’t find it,” Jarmack continued, “that wouldn’t be surprising, considering Psyche is considered a mostly metallic world.” But now, the team says, we’ll should wait until Psyche gets to Psyche in 2029 and starts employing its own technologies meant to check the elusive space rock.
As an example, the 6,056-pound (2,747 kilograms) explorer carries a multispectral imager that may photograph the asteroid in visible light wavelengths and near-infrared wavelengths; it has a gamma-ray and neutron spectrometer that will help reveal chemical elements that make up the rock’s surface; and a magnetometer that may search for proof of an ancient magnetic field on the topic. And that is not even all of it.
“We want to physically visit Psyche to check it up close and learn more about what appears to be a really unique planetary body,” McAdam said.