Sci-Five | The Hindu Science Quiz: On Asteroids

Once Jupiter formed, its massive gravity held the remaining millions of space rocks captive and prevented them from forming more planetary bodies between Mars and itself. These rubble remnants in their pristine forms make up a rocky world — the Asteroid Belt— in the vast expanse between Mars and Jupiter.

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The largest asteroid is called Ceres. It is about one-quarter the size of the moon.

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Asteroids are made mostly of rock—with some composed of clay and silicate—and different metals, mostly nickel and iron.

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OSIRIS-REx was a NASA asteroid-study and sample-return mission that visited and collected samples from 101955 Bennu, a carbonaceous near-Earth asteroid.

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In 2015, scientists observed water trails called gullies on the asteroid Vesta. When a small asteroid collides with a bigger one, the impact melts the trapped water ice in the smaller asteroid, trickling on the bigger asteroid, leaving a water trail in the rocks.

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