Latest OSIRIS-REx Stories

WASHINGTON, May 16, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- NASA's first mission to sample an asteroid is moving ahead into development and testing in preparation for its launch in 2016. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) The Origins-Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) passed a confirmation review Wednesday called Key Decision Point (KDP)-C. NASA officials reviewed a series of detailed project assessments and...

John P. Millis, Ph.D. for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online NASA's Origins-Spectral Interpretation-Resource Identification-Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft, scheduled to be launched in 2016, will touch down on an asteroid in 2018. Then, after collecting samples from the surface, the probe will rocket back to Earth, returning its find to be studied by terrestrial scientists by 2023. But project leaders noticed that the asteroid in question, asteroid (101955) 1999...

WASHINGTON, May 1, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- An asteroid that will be explored by a NASA spacecraft has a new name, thanks to a third-grade student in North Carolina. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) NASA's Origins-Spectral Interpretation-Resource Identification-Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft will visit the asteroid now called Bennu, named after an important ancient Egyptian avian deity. OSIRIS-REx is scheduled to launch in...

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory Like many of his colleagues at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., Shyam Bhaskaran is working a lot with asteroids these days. And also like many of his colleagues, the deep space navigator devotes a great deal of time to crafting, and contemplating, computer-generated 3-D models of these intriguing nomads of the solar system. But while many of his coworkers are calculating asteroids' past, present and future locations in the cosmos,...

University of Arizona Scientists at the University of Arizona welcome President Barack Obama's NASA budget proposal, rolled out today, and specifically its focus on gaining a better understanding of asteroids that could potentially harm Earth. The UA has a unique depth of capabilities and expertise that can help inform such missions and ensure their success. The UA is operating the most prolific ground-based system for identifying near-Earth asteroids, and it is tasked by NASA with...

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online NASA will be launching a new mission in 2016 to help estimate what kind of impact an asteroid would make if it struck Earth. The OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security, and Regolith Explorer) mission will travel to a potentially hazardous asteroid (PHA), and make measurements of the Yarkovsky effect. This effect is a push on an asteroid that happens when it is warmed up by the sun and then...

Watch the Video: NASA Announces Asteroid Naming Contest Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online NASA is opening up an opportunity for students to help name an asteroid the space agency will be gathering samples from and returning back to Earth. The Origins-Spectral Interpretation-Resource Identification-Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) mission is scheduled to launch in 2016. During the mission, a spacecraft will land on the near-earth asteroid currently called 1999...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 4, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Students worldwide have an opportunity to name an asteroid from which an upcoming NASA mission will return the first samples to Earth. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) Scheduled to launch in 2016, the mission is called the Origins-Spectral Interpretation-Resource Identification-Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx). Samples returned from the primitive surface of the near-Earth asteroid currently...