CURRENT AFFAIRS

Detailed explanation-1: -One of the biggest challenges was that Bennu has an extremely rocky surface with hazardous boulders. After a year, the mission team selected a sample site called “Nightingale” located in a northern crater 460 feet (140 meters) wide.

Detailed explanation-2: -This mission is also sometimes called New Frontiers 3, for it being the third of the New Frontiers program missions. The acronym OSIRIS was chosen in reference to the ancient mythological Egyptian god Osiris, the underworld lord of the dead.

Detailed explanation-3: -NASA’s OSIRIS-REx is an ongoing mission that visited and collected a sample from asteroid 101955 Bennu, with the aim of returning the sample to Earth in 2023. OSIRIS-Rex launched on Sept. 8, 2016, and arrived at asteroid Bennu on Dec. 3, 2018.

Detailed explanation-4: -NASA’s first asteroid sample return spacecraft, OSIRIS-REx, fired its thrusters for 30 seconds on Sept. 21 and nudged its trajectory toward Earth. The resulting course correction keeps the vehicle on track to deliver a sample of asteroid Bennu to Earth on Sept. 24, 2023, completing a seven-year mission.

Detailed explanation-5: -Near-Earth asteroid Bennu is a rubble pile of rocks and boulders left over from the formation of the solar system. On October 20, 2020, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft briefly touched down on Bennu and collected a sample for return to Earth.