spacetoday.net: Stardust returns more data from comet flyby

Posted: Wed, Jan 7, 2004, 11:36 AM ET (1636 GMT)
Stardust updated image of Wild-2 nucleus (NASA/JPL)

NASA's Stardust spacecraft has transmitted additional images and other data from its flyby of the comet Wild-2, scientists said Tuesday. Project scientists said the spacecraft's camera, designed primarily for navigation, took 72 images of the comet’s nucleus that are among the best ever taken of any comet. The images reveal several jets of material emitted by the nucleus, and allow scientists to trace those jets back to features on the surface. Scientists also reported that the number of particles the spacecraft encountered in the comet’s coma varied greatly as it passed through streams of material not expected prior to the flyby. On at least 10 occasions impacts from those particles breached the first layer of the spacecraft's Whipple shields, although additional layers of shielding protected the spacecraft from damage. The spacecraft gathered some of those particles in a special collector that was stowed back within the spacecraft six hours after the flyby; those particles will be placed in a capsule that will return to Earth in January 2006, parachuting to a designated site in Utah.