Canada to Receive Sample of Asteroid Bennu From NASA

Samples of Asteroid Bennu landed in the Utah desert on Sept. 24.

NASA scientists prepare the sample return capsule from NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission for transport shortly after the capsule landed at the Department of Defense's Utah Test and Training Range, on Sept. 24, 2023. Keegan Barber/NASA/Getty Images

In return for the Canadian Space Agency’s contribution to NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, agency scientists will receive a portion of asteroid material collected by the mission.

Samples of Asteroid Bennu landed in the Utah desert on Sept. 24 at 10:52 a.m. Eastern Time, the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) announced in a press release the same day.

“The sample retrieved on asteroid Bennu could hold the answer to some of the most fundamental questions about the solar system’s history and the origins of water and life on Earth,” the statement said.

The instrumental role of the Canadian OSIRIS-REx laser altimeter (OLA) was pivotal to the mission. The OLA, a remote sensing technology that uses laser pulses to calculate distances and heights, was used to conduct a comprehensive scan and precise measurements of the asteroid’s entire surface, helping identify an optimal site for specimen collection.

Professor Mike Daly, York research chair in planetary science with the Centre for Research in Earth and Space Science at York University in Toronto, and leader of the OSIRIS-REx OLA science team for the CSA, is excited about the project.

“We get most of our information from asteroids by meteorites that fall to earth and then we try to figure out where they came from,” Mr. Daly said in a York University press release on Sept. 21.

“We have few meteorites that look similar to Bennu and a unique aspect is just how pristine this sample is. We don’t know what we will find, and now we have the opportunity to study material that just may never make it to Earth.”

Almost three billion measurements were taken to create a model representation of Asteroid Bennu, the press release said.

Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry François-Philippe Champagne said Canada played a significant part in the mission’s success.

“Thanks to a sought-after expertise in optics, Canada played a major role in the largest sample return mission from outside the orbit of the Moon,” Mr. Champagne said.

“With OSIRIS-REx, Canada is paving the way for decades of exciting space research and scientific discovery for generations to come while setting itself apart as a global leader, through the efforts of our world-renowned scientists and researchers.”

NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston will curate and distribute the sample to scientists and international collaborators.

Experts from the CSA and other Canadian scientists will be actively involved in choosing the components of the Canadian sample, which is expected to reach the John H. Chapman Space Centre CSA headquarters by 2024 at the earliest.

This achievement will make Canada the fifth nation globally to acquire and curate a sample from space.

After New Horizons’ mission launch in 2006 and Juno’s launch in 2011, OSIRIS-REx was NASA’s third major planetary science mission.

The acronym “OSIRIS-REx” stands for “Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer.” The mission aimed to retrieve a sample, weighing no less than 2.1 ounces, from the near-Earth Asteroid Bennu and return it to Earth.

Conceived by researchers from the University of Arizona and launched on Sept. 8, 2016, the mission promises to provide valuable insight into the formation of the early solar system and the origins of life. Additionally, it will help with understanding asteroids that may pose a future potential threat to Earth, NASA said.