Planetary Group Seminar

In October 2018, Hayabusa2 dropped a small lander to the surface of C-type asteroid Ryugu. MASCOT revealed the surface of a small asteroid as never seen before. I will discuss some of the major findings of this mission: MASCOT was able to characterize a rock on Ryugu from very close distance. Multi-colored inclusions in the rock strongly suggest a link between the C-type asteroid Ryugu and carbonaceous chondrites. The rock density, inferred to be very low, raises the question of whether such a rock could survive atmospheric entry and whether have a Ryugu-type rocks in our meteorite collections. [more]