NASA’s Lucy probe will fly by the asteroid Donaldjohanson on Easter Sunday

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Easter Sunday actually will not be a day of relaxation for the astronomy group.

All eyes shall be on NASA’s asteroid-studying Lucy spacecraft, which is because of have an in depth encounter at 1:51 p.m. EDT (1751 GMT) on April 20, 2025.

Launched in 2021, Lucy is on a 12-year journey to the orbit of Jupiter, throughout which the probe will carry out flybys of eight Trojan asteroids in a quest to be taught concerning the origins of the solar system, trying to find parts that might spark the rise of life. However earlier than Lucy will get there, the spacecraft may have time for a number of costume rehearsals.

The primary was a flyby of the asteroid Dinkinesh on Nov. 1, 2023. This coming Sunday, Lucy will zip previous her second goal, the asteroid Donaldjohanson. Lucy will cross by the asteroid at a distance of about 620 miles (1,000 kilometers), take a look at its science devices within the course of.

These instruments embrace L’Ralph, a coloration digital camera and an infrared imaging spectrometer; L’LLORI, the high-resolution Lucy Lengthy Vary Reconnaissance Imager; and L’TES, the far-infrared Lucy Thermal Emission Spectrometer.

“We will observe [Donaldjohanson] as if it was one of many Trojan asteroids, as a result of we wished to have a whole follow run,” Arizona State College professor Phil Christensen, who designed L’TES, stated in a video interview. The aim, he shares, is to determine the asteroid’s composition.

Associated tales:

— NASA’s asteroid-hopping Lucy probe takes 1st images of its next target: Donaldjohanson

— Asteroid ‘Dinky,’ visited by NASA’s Lucy spacecraft, birthed its own moon

— NASA’s Lucy asteroid-hopping spacecraft pins down surface ages of 1st asteroid targets

Lucy and Donaldjohanson are related by way over their upcoming bodily proximity. The NASA mission was named after the three-million-year-old fossil australopithecine skeleton found in Ethiopia 1974, which contributed to our understanding of human evolution. And who found these bones? Paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson, founding father of Arizona State College’s Institute of Human Origins.

Johanson spoke with Christensen in the course of the video interview to debate the Lucy mission, and Christensen had one crucial query to ask. If, as scientists predict, a secondary asteroid is found in the course of the Donaldjohanson flyby — asteroids typically journey in pairs — what would Johanson wish to identify it?

“Oh, I’ll have to provide that some actual thought,” stated Johanson.