FUTURE TECH
ASTEROID NETS
A space fishing trip could capture an asteroid and bring it closer to Earth to study
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I nJune 2010, the Japanese Hayabusa probe succeeded in returning to Earth the first samples from a distant stoney asteroid known as 25143 Itokawa. Until recent years, such missions have rarely been successful because returning samples to Earth is very difficult. But what if the asteroid were closer? Since 2013, NASA scientists have been working on plans to identify and capture a small near-Earth asteroid – anything up to about eight metres (26 feet) in diameter – and then redirect it into a stable orbit around the Moon, where it would be accessible to Earth-based astronauts.