2023-09-17 17:10:02
JVTech News Something strange is happening with Dimorphos, the asteroid we deflected during the DART mission.
Published on 09/17/2023 at 7:10 p.m.
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The DART mission opened a new era in our understanding of planetary defense against potential threats from space, while raising exciting questions within the scientific community. The combination of the audacity of amateur science and the anticipation of future space missions promises to bring us clearer answers to the orbital mysteries of Dimorphos.
NASA’s DART Mission – Impact and Anomalies
Nearly a year has passed since NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission struck Dimorphos, the smaller of the two asteroids that make up the Didymos system. This daring mission aimed to test the possibility of deflect the trajectory of an asteroid by hitting it, with the aim of protecting the Earth from a possible meteorite impact. Initially, the DART mission had no other objective.
On September 27, 2022, early in the morning (GMT), humanity sent a space probe to collide with Dimorphos, an asteroid more than 160 meters long in orbit around Didymos, another asteroid, more massive than its little brother . The mission was a success, since we managed to slightly deviate Dimorphos’ trajectory. However, this success was accompanied by an intriguing discovery: the orbital period of the asteroid was modified.
Initially, this period was 11 hours and 55 minutes, but after impact it increased to 11 hours and 23 minutes, i.e. a reduction of approximately 32 minutes. Subsequent calculations further refined this result, setting the orbital period reduction at 33 minutes, with a margin of error of approximately 18 seconds. Here’s where the weird stuff starts: a new study found that the reduction would currently be 34.2 minutes, with a margin of error of about 6 seconds.
The orbital period observations were made 20 to 30 days after impact, raising the possibility that the asteroid underwent an acceleration in the days following the first observations. Faced with the observation of a continuous reduction in the orbital period of Dimorphos, scientists are asking themselves new questions: today, astronomers around the world are looking into this anomaly to understand the causes.
An Original Study Produced by Amateurs and the Waiting for the Hera Mission
What makes the latest observation of Dimorphos even more unusual is that it was not carried out by a team of professional astronomers. The observations were made using a relatively modest telescope located at the Thacher Observatory in California. It is a 0.7 meter mirror telescope operated by the Thacher School, a preparatory education institution. Leading this initiative is a professor and his students, demonstrating that science and space research are not just for renowned experts. The draft detailing this study has been published on the ArXiv repository, where it will be reviewed by the scientific community. As you can imagine, although the results of these “amateurs” are promising, they require further confirmation.
While waiting for more definitive answers, the Hera mission of the European Space Agency (ESA) is preparing and it will surely have a major impact on future discoveries linked to the DART mission. Scheduled for October 2024, Hera will head towards the Didymos system, with an expected arrival in December 2026. This new mission will be able to conduct detailed in situ analyzes about the changes occurring in the Didymos system, particularly on Dimorphos. It will collect data not only on the orbital period of this asteroid, but also on its environment, including debris left by the impact and possible craters formed during the collision.
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