Hayabusa 2 | 04 Oct 2018

Hayabusa 2 is an Asteroid exploration mission by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to study Asteroid 1999 JU3 (Ryugu).

Hayabusa 2 was launched in December, 2014 and is planned to complete a mission of six years
It arrived at Ryugu in July 2018 and will spend 18 months studying the asteroid before making its return to Earth in December 2020.
The mission builds on the original Hayabusa mission that was launched in 2003 and successfully linked up with asteroid Itokawa in 2005.
It returned samples to Earth in 2010 marking the first time sample materials from an asteroid were brought back to Earth.

Two remote sensing spectrometers dedicated to studying the energy balance of the asteroid and its surface composition.
Four landers – the 10-Kilogram Mobile Asteroid Surface Scout (MASCOT) lander built in Europe (France and Germany) for an in-situ study of surface composition and properties.
Three MINERVA landers to deliver imagery and temperature measurements. All landers will make several hops across the asteroid’s surface to take measurements at different locations.
An impactor device that will be deployed towards the asteroid and uses high-explosives to generate a high-speed impact that is hoped to expose material from under the asteroid’s surface for later collection by Hayabusa 2.

Asteroids, like comets, are primitive bodies that can be considered to be the building blocks of the early solar system.
They hold a record of the birth and initial evolution of the solar system.
Larger planets like Earth went through a more complex evolution over which the pristine materials were melted and altered significantly.
Due to this change, the materials found on large planets do not hold information into their early stages of formation.
Comets and asteroids, formed early in the evolution of the Solar System, retain a record of when, where and in what conditions they were formed. Exploration of these primitive bodies is essential in gaining insight into the formation of the Solar System.