Asteroid Dinky, visited by NASA’s Lucy spacecraft, has given birth to its own moon

Scientists may have learned the story of the little one contact-binary moon asteroid in orbit 152830 Dinkineshwhich was the first space station for NASA Lucy spacecraft. This moonbird may have separated from its larger parent an asteroid when Dinkinesh was sent spinning through space after absorbing and re-emitting sunlight.

After launching in 2021, the Lucy mission is on track to explore the Trojan asteroids that share the orbit of Jupiter — but to get to them, Lucy has to go through asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. In a silver lining, however, it gave Lucy the chance to test her might on a small world in the asteroid belt before reaching the Trojans, who are stationed on Jupiter Lagrange points L4 and L5.

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