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                   Asteroid Sampling Mission Gets Green Light

   by VOA News

   NASA's first mission to rendezvous with an asteroid and return a sample
   to Earth was [1]given the green light to proceed into the development
   stage May 15 with the goal of a launch in 2016.
   The Origins-Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security
   Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) will rendezvous with the asteroid Bennu
   in 2018 and return a sample of it to Earth in 2023.
   "This means NASA believes we have an executable plan to return a sample
   from Bennu. It now falls on the project and its development team
   members to execute that plan," said Mike Donnelly, OSIRIS-REx project
   manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
   NASA says Bennu could hold clues about the origin of the solar system.
   It is expected to bring back a minimum of 60 grams of surface material
   from Bennu and also mapping the asteroid's  global properties and
   measuring non-gravitational forces.
   Bennu was discovered on September 11, 1999 and has a mean diameter of
   about 493 meters.
   The name Bennu, a heron-like Egyptian god similar to a phoenix, was
   selected earlier this month after NASA held naming contest. A third
   grader from North Carolina came up with the winning name.
   In the future, NASA plans to land humans on asteroids.
   Here's more on the mission:
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   [2]http://www.voanews.com/content/asteroid-sampling-mission-gets-green-
   light/1663146.html

References

   1. http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/osiris-rex/osiris-rex-development.html
   2. http://www.voanews.com/content/asteroid-sampling-mission-gets-green-light/1663146.html