The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope and the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope teamed up to collect data before and after NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) intentionally slammed into Dimorphos, a moonlet of the asteroid Didymos, on September 26, 2022.
These Hubble (left) and Webb (right) images show observations of the Didymos-Dimorphos system several hours after NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) intentionally impacted the moonlet. It was the world’s first test of the kinetic impact technique using a spacecraft to deflect an asteroid by modifying its orbit. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Jian-Yang Li, PSI / Cristina Thomas, Northern Arizona University / Ian Wong, NASA-GSFC / Joseph DePasquale, STScI / Alyssa Pagan, STScI.
“Webb and Hubble show what we’ve always known to be true at NASA: we learn more when we work together,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson.
“For the first time, Webb and Hubble have simultaneously captured imagery from the same target in the cosmos: an asteroid that was impacted by a spacecraft after a 7-million-mile journey.”
“All of humanity eagerly awaits the discoveries to come from Webb, Hubble, and our ground-based telescopes — about the DART mission and beyond.”
The Webb and Hubble observations will allow astronomers to gain knowledge about the nature of the surface of Dimorphos, how much material was ejected by the collision, and how fast it was ejected.
Additionally, Webb and Hubble captured the impact in different wavelengths of light — Webb in infrared and Hubble in visible.
Webb took one observation of the impact location before the collision took place, then several observations over the next few hours.
The telescope observed the impact over five hours total and captured 10 images.
Images from Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) show a tight, compact core, with plumes of material appearing as wisps streaming away from the center of where the impact took place.
Observing the impact with Webb presented the flight operations, planning, and science teams with unique challenges, because of the asteroid’s speed of travel across the sky.
As DART approached its target, the researchers performed additional work in the weeks leading up to the impact to enable and test a method of tracking asteroids moving over three times faster than the original speed limit set for Webb.
“I have nothing but tremendous admiration for the Webb Mission Operations folks that made this a reality,” said Dr. Cristina Thomas, a researcher at Northern Arizona University.
“We have been planning these observations for years, then in detail for weeks, and I’m tremendously happy this has come to fruition.”
Hubble also observed the binary asteroid ahead of the impact, then again 15 minutes after DART hit the surface of Dimorphos.
Ejecta from the impact appear as rays stretching out from the body of the asteroid.
The bolder, fanned-out spike of ejecta to the left of the asteroid is in the general direction from which DART approached.
Some of the rays appear to be curved slightly, but astronomers need to take a closer look to determine what this could mean.
In the Hubble images, astronomers estimate that the brightness of the system increased by three times after impact, and saw that brightness hold steady, even eight hours after impact.
“When I saw the data, I was literally speechless, stunned by the amazing detail of the ejecta that Hubble captured,” said Dr. Jian-Yang Li, a researcher at Planetary Science Institute.
“I feel lucky to witness this moment and be part of the team that made this happen.”
Hubble captured 45 images in the time immediately before and following DART’s impact with Dimorphos.
“This is an unprecedented view of an unprecedented event,” said Dr. Andy Rivkin, DART investigation team lead with the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.
Source link: https://www.sci.news/space/webb-hubble-dart-impact-11244.html
