A Year of Space Firsts
From robot landings on asteroids and exploring the furthest reaches of the solar system, to flying closer to the sun than ever before.
The Parker Solar Probe has flown nearer to the sun than any other mission. The probe is now sending back data on the behaviour of electromagnetic waves emitted from the coronal mass. Fluctuations in these waves can lead to solar flares ,which in turn can have a huge impact on earth, including the potential to knock out global communications.
The Japanese space agency鈥檚 Hayabusa mission successfully landed two robots on an asteroid 4 years away from earth. Next year the mission will return to mine rock samples from beneath the asteroids surface by shooting a 鈥榮pace cannon鈥� to blast samples from within the asteroid.
NASA has a similar mission planned again to collect rocks from an asteroid, their method is to use kind of 鈥榮pace hoover鈥� to suck up samples.
Picture: The surface of the sun, Credit: NASA
Presenter: Roland Pease
Producer: Julian Siddle
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- Thu 27 Dec 2018 20:32GMT大象传媒 World Service Online, Americas and the Caribbean, UK DAB/Freeview, News Internet & Europe and the Middle East only
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