spacetoday.net: Scientists confirm Hayabusa returned asteroid samples

Posted: Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 6:58 AM ET (1158 GMT)
Hayabusa spacecraft illus. (JAXA)

Japanese scientists have determined that dust particles returned to Earth by the Hayabusa spacecraft are from an asteroid the spacecraft visited, the Japanese space agency JAXA announced Tuesday. About 1,500 dust grains located in a compartment of Hayabusa's return capsule are rocky particles, JAXA reported, and most of them judged to be from the asteroids Itokawa. The capsule returned to Earth in June after a long journey back from the asteroid, which the spacecraft arrived at in 2005. The spacecraft had suffered from a number of problems, including with its sample collection mechanism, raising questions whether the spacecraft had been able to gather any samples. Scientists plan to perform further analysis of the samples in an effort to understand the composition of the asteroid.