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Achievement of the Planetary Defense Investigations of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) Mission

Authors :
Nancy L. Chabot
Andrew S. Rivkin
Andrew F. Cheng
Olivier S. Barnouin
Eugene G. Fahnestock
Derek C. Richardson
Angela M. Stickle
Cristina A. Thomas
Carolyn M. Ernst
R. Terik Daly
Elisabetta Dotto
Angelo Zinzi
Steven R. Chesley
Nicholas A. Moskovitz
Brent W. Barbee
Paul Abell
Harrison F. Agrusa
Michele T. Bannister
Joel Beccarelli
Dmitriy L. Bekker
Megan Bruck Syal
Bonnie J. Buratti
Michael W. Busch
Adriano Campo Bagatin
Joseph P. Chatelain
Sidney Chocron
Gareth S. Collins
Luca Conversi
Thomas M. Davison
Mallory E. DeCoster
J. D. Prasanna Deshapriya
Siegfried Eggl
Raymond C. Espiritu
Tony L. Farnham
Marin Ferrais
Fabio Ferrari
Dora Föhring
Oscar Fuentes-Muñoz
Igor Gai
Carmine Giordano
David A. Glenar
Edward Gomez
Dawn M. Graninger
Simon F. Green
Sarah Greenstreet
Pedro H. Hasselmann
Isabel Herreros
Masatoshi Hirabayashi
Marek Husárik
Simone Ieva
Stavro L. Ivanovski
Samuel L. Jackson
Emmanuel Jehin
Martin Jutzi
Ozgur Karatekin
Matthew M. Knight
Ludmilla Kolokolova
Kathryn M. Kumamoto
Michael Küppers
Fiorangela La Forgia
Monica Lazzarin
Jian-Yang Li
Tim A. Lister
Ramin Lolachi
Michael P. Lucas
Alice Lucchetti
Robert Luther
Rahil Makadia
Elena Mazzotta Epifani
Jay McMahon
Gianmario Merisio
Colby C. Merrill
Alex J. Meyer
Patrick Michel
Marco Micheli
Alessandra Migliorini
Kate Minker
Dario Modenini
Fernando Moreno
Naomi Murdoch
Brian Murphy
Shantanu P. Naidu
Hari Nair
Ryota Nakano
Cyrielle Opitom
Jens Ormö
J. Michael Owen
Maurizio Pajola
Eric E. Palmer
Pasquale Palumbo
Paolo Panicucci
Laura M. Parro
Jason M. Pearl
Antti Penttilä
Davide Perna
Elisabeta Petrescu
Petr Pravec
Sabina D. Raducan
K. T. Ramesh
Ryan Ridden-Harper
Juan L. Rizos
Alessandro Rossi
Nathan X. Roth
Agata Rożek
Benjamin Rozitis
Eileen V. Ryan
William H. Ryan
Paul Sánchez
Toni Santana-Ros
Daniel J. Scheeres
Peter Scheirich
Cem Berk Senel
Colin Snodgrass
Stefania Soldini
Damya Souami
Thomas S. Statler
Rachel Street
Timothy J. Stubbs
Jessica M. Sunshine
Nicole J. Tan
Gonzalo Tancredi
Calley L. Tinsman
Paolo Tortora
Filippo Tusberti
James D. Walker
C. Dany Waller
Kai Wünnemann
Marco Zannoni
Yun Zhang
Source :
The Planetary Science Journal, Vol 5, Iss 2, p 49 (2024)
Publication Year :
2024
Publisher :
IOP Publishing, 2024.

Abstract

NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission was the first to demonstrate asteroid deflection, and the mission's Level 1 requirements guided its planetary defense investigations. Here, we summarize DART's achievement of those requirements. On 2022 September 26, the DART spacecraft impacted Dimorphos, the secondary member of the Didymos near-Earth asteroid binary system, demonstrating an autonomously navigated kinetic impact into an asteroid with limited prior knowledge for planetary defense. Months of subsequent Earth-based observations showed that the binary orbital period was changed by –33.24 minutes, with two independent analysis methods each reporting a 1 σ uncertainty of 1.4 s. Dynamical models determined that the momentum enhancement factor, β , resulting from DART's kinetic impact test is between 2.4 and 4.9, depending on the mass of Dimorphos, which remains the largest source of uncertainty. Over five dozen telescopes across the globe and in space, along with the Light Italian CubeSat for Imaging of Asteroids, have contributed to DART's investigations. These combined investigations have addressed topics related to the ejecta, dynamics, impact event, and properties of both asteroids in the binary system. A year following DART's successful impact into Dimorphos, the mission has achieved its planetary defense requirements, although work to further understand DART's kinetic impact test and the Didymos system will continue. In particular, ESA's Hera mission is planned to perform extensive measurements in 2027 during its rendezvous with the Didymos–Dimorphos system, building on DART to advance our knowledge and continue the ongoing international collaboration for planetary defense.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
26323338
Volume :
5
Issue :
2
Database :
Directory of Open Access Journals
Journal :
The Planetary Science Journal
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
edsdoj.0a519bcd35754cc49681152142d32c4f
Document Type :
article
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.3847/PSJ/ad16e6