Technologies

NASA Brings Home Asteroid Sample Swiped by Osiris-Rex Spacecraft

A tiny shipment grabbed from a space rock touched down in the Utah desert on Sunday.

For the first time, NASA has returned some dust and other bits of an asteroid collected in space to Earth for study.

Pieces of a large asteroid named Bennu were jarred loose and collected nearly three years ago by NASA’s Osiris-Rex spacecraft, which launched over seven years ago from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

On Sunday morning, the spacecraft released a capsule that landed a little over four hours later, at 9:52 a.m. PT, in the Department of Defense’s Utah Test and Training Range. Within 20 minutes, scientists, engineers and military personnel arrived by helicopter to inspect and secure the capsule, which was transported to a nearby cleanroom. It will be moved to Johnson Space Center in Houston on Monday.

«While this may feel like the end of an incredible chapter, it’s truly just the beginning of another,» Dante Lauretta, principal investigator for Osiris-Rex based at the University of Arizona, said in a statement. «We now have the unprecedented opportunity to analyze these samples and delve deeper into the secrets of our solar system.»

In 2020, the van-size spacecraft performed a «touch and go» maneuver — sort of like a chest bump in space — and swiped a few ounces of material from the space rock, which is really a pile of rubble held together by its own gravity. Osiris-Rex lingered around Bennu until 2021, when it started its two-year journey back to Earth.

Graphic showing the route of the asteroid sample from the Osiris-Rex spacecraft to its landing in the Utah desert.

Since launching on Sept. 8, 2016, Osiris-Rex has traveled billions of miles to Bennu and back. It is the first such mission led by NASA. Japan’s space agency sent two spacecraft, named Hayabusa and Hayabusa 2, to collect and deliver samples from asteroids Itokawa and Ryugu, respectively.

In Houston, the sample will undergo preliminary analysis and be unveiled on Oct. 11 in a livestreamed news conference. It’s hoped the sample will provide scientists with a window into the birth of the solar system, including the sun and planets, some 4.5 billion years ago.

As for the main spacecraft, it isn’t done. After sending its treasure to the surface, Osiris-Rex fired its engines to avoid smashing into the atmosphere. It will now continue on to its next target, the asteroid Apophis, under the new moniker Osiris-Apex (Osiris-Apophis Explorer). The vehicle isn’t equipped to collect and deliver another sample, but it may try to blast the asteroid with its gas thrusters in an attempt to dislodge dust and other small bits for study.

Apophis is an important target because it’s considered a potentially hazardous asteroid. While any chance of it impacting Earth in the next century has been ruled out, it will be worth keeping a close eye on for centuries to come.

Technologies

Australians Flock to VPNs in the Wake of Online Age-Restriction Laws

App downloads for VPN services increase sharply as websites in Australia go behind age-restriction walls.

A new set of laws in Australia requiring adult websites and app stores to age-restrict content for those under 18, and requiring AI companies to restrict chatbot offerings from displaying certain types of sensitive or adult content to minors, is apparently driving many to download Virtual Private Network apps there.

Major adult sites have closed their virtual doors to those who aren’t age-confirmed in Australia, and these changes follow a nationwide ban on social media use by teenagers and young children that went into effect in December.

According to reports from Reuters, The Guardian and others, in response to the bans, downloads of VPN-related apps, which people can use to circumvent location-based restrictions, are sharply on the rise. According to Reuters, three of the 15 most downloaded free iPhone apps in the country were VPN-related as the new laws went into effect on Monday.

Lawmakers in some regions, including the US, are well aware that people use VPNs in this way. In states such as Michigan and Wisconsin, laws are being proposed to limit or outright ban VPN use. Wisconsin’s proposed law would require adult sites to block VPN traffic, while Michigan’s proposal would ban VPN use entirely in the state.

There is also a proposal in England under consideration to ban VPN use by minors. That proposal is currently under review.

Technologies

Here’s How to Track the Artemis II Mission in Real Time With NASA’s New Tool

The tool will let you track NASA’s modern lunar program during its 10-day flight around the moon and back again.

More than half a century after astronauts last left footprints on the lunar surface, humanity is preparing to return to the moon. The excitement surrounding NASA’s Apollo program once captivated the world, and now NASA hopes to rekindle that same sense of wonder with its modern lunar effort, the Artemis program.

NASA’s Artemis II launch is scheduled for the first week of April. It’ll be the first human mission to the moon since 1972, and it should be quite the achievement for the Artemis program. Now, NASA has released a new tool that lets the public track Artemis II in real time.

The Artemis program is NASA’s long-term effort to return humans to the moon and establish a sustained presence there for the first time since the Apollo program. The program aims to land astronauts near the lunar south pole, develop new technologies for long-term exploration and use the moon as a stepping stone for future missions to Mars.

The Artemis Real-time Orbit Website, dubbed AROW, is already available to the public, although there isn’t much to see since the launch is still a few weeks away. It’s also available directly from the NASA app if you’re using a mobile device. The site lets the public visualize data collected by sensors on Orion and sent to the Mission Control Center at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

The website is simple to navigate. You’ll see a visual representation of Artemis II’s progress, including its speed, distance from Earth and distance to the moon. Mobile app users get all of the above, along with an extra augmented reality tracker that lets you point your phone at the sky and see where Artemis II is relative to your position on Earth. It works much like Google Star Map and other stargazing apps that use similar technology.

According to NASA, tracking will be available once the Orion capsule separates from the rocket’s upper stage, which is expected about 3 hours after the upcoming April launch. The site will then update its information in real time for the entire 10-day mission.

NASA is also making flight data available for download so that people interested in creating their own content, such as visualizations or tracking apps, can do so. The data will include all sorts of things, including state vectors, which are data that «describe precisely where Orion is located and how it moves.» That same data will be used by NASA to study Orion and make improvements for future Artemis missions.

An exact launch date for Artemis II hasn’t been set, but the agency plans on launching the mission no earlier than April 1. The launch was originally scheduled for February, but it was delayed multiple times due to a hydrogen leak and a helium flow issue. NASA says it has since fixed both issues.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections Hints, Answers and Help for March 10, #1003

Here are some hints and the answers for the NYT Connections puzzle for March 10, No. 1,003

Looking for the most recent Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s NYT Connections puzzle is a fun and diverse mix. If you know your US states, you’ll surely solve the blue category early. Read on for clues and today’s Connections answers.

The Times has a Connections Bot, like the one for Wordle. Go there after you play to receive a numeric score and to have the program analyze your answers. Players who are registered with the Times Games section can now nerd out by following their progress, including the number of puzzles completed, win rate, number of times they nabbed a perfect score and their win streak.

Read more: Hints, Tips and Strategies to Help You Win at NYT Connections Every Time

Hints for today’s Connections groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Think Julia Child.

Green group hint: Also, Bro and Sis.

Blue group hint: Minn. and Ore. are two others.

Purple group hint: Hit with your fist.