Rendezvous with a near Earth object
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 - 08:01
in Astronomy & Space
(PhysOrg.com) -- One of the most accessible goals for human spaceflight is a rendezvous with a Near Earth Object (NEO). NEOs are asteroids or comets whose orbits take them close to the earth's orbit. An NEO might someday collide with the earth -- and there are almost 6000 larger in diameter than about 100 meters known, with predictions that over ten times as many could exist. The impact of even a one-kilometer-sized NEO would probably destroy an average state, and this is certainly one reason to study them. From the perspective of pure science, NEOs are important nearby representatives of the early Solar System.