25143 Itokawa

Author(s): Greg Frieger Art Blos Sirius_Alpha Phil Stooke

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25143 Itokawa is a near-Earth S-type asteroid. It was discovered by the LINEAR program in September 1998. It measures 330 meters in diameter. Itokawa is considered a pile of rubble, consisting of several boulders of different sizes rather than a single solid body. Itokawa was the first asteroid to be targeted by a sample return mission, the Japanese space probe Hayabusa which collected more than 1500 regolith dust particles from the asteroid's surface in 2005. Upon their return to Earth in 2010, these particles were studied in detail to provide insights into the formation and evolution of the Solar System.

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