Space engineers in Japan are scoping out an ambitious follow-up to the country's Hayabusa mission, which snagged samples from the asteroid Itokawa and returned them to Earth in 2010.
The successor spacecraft, known as Hayabusa 2, would carry out an aggressive study of another asteroid. The probe would drop off two landers, blast the asteroid with an impactor and send more samples back to Earth for close-up inspection.
Earlier this year, Tokyo-based NEC Corporation announced it had started designing the new asteroid explorer for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). (Space.com)
Space engineers in Japan are scoping out an ambitious follow-up to the country's Hayabusa mission, which snagged samples from the asteroid Itokawa and returned them to Earth in 2010.
The successor spacecraft, known as Hayabusa 2, would carry out an aggressive study of another asteroid. The probe would drop off two landers, blast the asteroid with an impactor and send more samples back to Earth for close-up inspection.
Earlier this year, Tokyo-based NEC Corporation announced it had started designing the new asteroid explorer for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). (Space.com)