In News
- NASA is set to launch its first spacecraft to study Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids.
About the Mission
- Origin:
- Named after an ancient fossil 3.2 million-year-old ancestor who belonged to a species of hominins.
- Aim & Objective:
- To get insights into the formation of the solar system 4.5 billion years ago.
- Investigating the group of rocky bodies that are circling the Sun in two swarms- one preceding Jupiter and the other trailing behind it.
- Duration:
- A 12-year journey of eight different asteroids including one in the Main Belt between Mars & Jupiter and seven Trojans.
- Donald Johnson Asteroid:
- The spacecraft’s first encounter will be with an asteroid that lies in the main belt that can be found between Mars and Jupiter.
- This asteroid is named ‘Donald Johnson’ after the paleoanthropologist who discovered the fossilised remains of “Lucy”.
Significance
- Trojan asteroids are formed from the same material that of Planets formed
- Origins and evolution of the Solar System.
What are Asteroids?
- About:
- Rocky objects revolving around the sun that are too small to be called planets.
- Classification based on their orbits:
- Main asteroid belt b/w Mars and Jupiter.
- Trojan asteroids orbit a larger planet in two special places, known as Lagrange points, where the gravitational pull of the sun and the planet are balanced.
- NASA reports the presence of Jupiter, Neptune and Mars trojans. In 2011, they reported an Earth trojan as well.
- Near-Earth Asteroids (NEA), circle closer to Earth than the sun.
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Lagrange Points
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Source: IE
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