The NASA mission which aims to gather samples from an asteroid and send them back to Earth was cleared by a technical review and engineers were already given a go-signal to start building the spacecraft.
The mission, also known as OSIRIS-REX, has a target launch of September 2016 from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The $800-million mission will direct the spacecraft to meet with asteroid 1999 RQ36, named Bennu. The spacecraft will perform mapping and surveying tasks aside from collecting rock samples. It is scheduled to come back to Earth on 2023, Reuters reports.
The technical assessment for the mission was conducted by an independent panel and after careful deliberation; they cleared Lockheed Martin Corp, the primary contractor, to start building their spacecraft. The clearance will also allow the contractor to build and acquire needed ground system equipment and flight instruments.
"The OSIRIS-Rex team has consistently demonstrated its ability to present a comprehensive mission design that meets all requirements within the resources provided by NASA," lead scientist Dante Lauretta, from the University of Arizona in Tucson, said in a press release.
In August 2013, NASA signed a $183.5 million contract with United Launch Services. The contract will give an Atlas 5 rocket for NASA and other flight services in light of the OSIRIS-Rex's launch. United Launch Services and United Launch Alliance were products of the partnership between Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin.
The rock samples gathered by OSIRIS-Rex will be used to further the studies about how similar chemicals and minerals from asteroids and other celestial bodies started the earliest life forms on Earth. Scientists have long believed in the theory that the matter that provided us with water and other minerals essential to life came from the substances found in other members of the solar system.
"This is a pioneering effort, both technologically and scientifically," Lauretta added.
