asteroids

Dinosaur-killing asteroid identified as rare ‘oddball’ meteorite

The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago has been identified as a CO chondrite — one of the rarest and most primitive classes of space rock known to science. The finding, published July 17 in Science…

China, Japan release first close-up images from two asteroid flybys

In a striking coincidence of timing, space agencies from China and Japan have each released new closeup images from flybys of two different asteroids, offering fresh views of these rocky worlds within days of each other.

JAXA reveals asteroid Torifune is a rare contact binary after Hayabusa2 flyby

Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft completed a high-speed flyby of asteroid Torifune on July 5, passing within roughly 800 meters of the space rock at 5 kilometers per second — about 18,000 km/h — and capturing images that revealed the asteroid to…

China’s Tianwen-2 probe reaches asteroid after 1B km journey

China's Tianwen-2 space probe has arrived within 20 kilometers of near-Earth asteroid Kamo'oalewa after traveling approximately one billion kilometers over roughly 400 days, the China National Space Administration announced on Monday.

Japan’s Hayabusa2 completes high-speed flyby of asteroid Torifune

Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft flew past the asteroid Torifune on Sunday evening, passing within close range of the roughly 450-meter-wide space rock at a relative speed of about 5 kilometers per second — approximately 18,000 kilometers per hour — in a…

NASA’s Lucy mission finds ancient water on asteroid Donaldjohanson

NASA's Lucy spacecraft has revealed that asteroid Donaldjohanson once harbored liquid water, according to findings published in the journal Science on June 18, 2026. The results, drawn from data collected during Lucy's flyby of the asteroid on April 20, 2025,…