Rover Lost in Space.

This article reports that a tiny robotic rover intended to inspect the surface of the near-Earth asteroid Itokawa is drifting helplessly in space following a botched deployment. Dubbed Minerva, the rover was supposed to take images of the asteroid from which its parent craft, Hayabusa, will later collect rock samples. But a malfunction released Minerva 200 meters above the surface rather than the intended 60 meters, leaving it outside Itokawa's gravitational pull. Jun'ichiro Kawaguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, said that the agency hopes Hayabusa's descent close to the surface of Itokawa to release Minerva will pay off later this month when it attempts touchdowns to retrieve samples. Hayabusa is looking for clues about the composition of planetary bodies and how they have been transformed by "space weathering."