The first asteroid sample return in US history has been completed. Asteroids are celestial bodies that orbit the Sun, and a majority of them are found in the asteroid belt that is located between Mars and Jupiter. Asteroids can hold lots of information that scientists would love to get their hands on, so NASA started a sample retrieval mission back in 2016. The sample has finally been brought to Earth. 

Bennu is the asteroid that they sent a spacecraft to retrieve a sample from. OSIRIS-REx  (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer) was what went to Bennu to get a sample. It collected the sample on Oct. 20, 2020, and the sample capsule returned to Earth on Sept. 24, 2023, in Utah. 

The sample capsule was first taken to a clean room, which is where it went through a nitrogen purge, in a nearby military hangar. It was then taken to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, where it will be cared for and distributed by scientists. 

Studying asteroids is incredibly important because asteroids are full of information about the history of the solar system, especially for Bennu since the rocks that make it up are so old. The rocks are also very loosely packed, meaning that they could pose a different kind of threat if Bennu hit Earth, and it would most likely break apart in the atmosphere. This was surprising to the NASA scientists that were a part of this project, since they first were going off of what they could see with telescopes. When OSIRIS-REx was able to land on Bennu to collect the sample, they found that it had almost sunk into the asteroid.

NASA will share their findings and the first images taken of the sample in a live broadcast on Oct. 11. Now that OSIRIS-REx has completed its mission, it will be headed towards another asteroid, Apophis, and has been renamed OSIRIS-APEX, for OSIRIS-Apophis Explorer.