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Instrument for NASA asteroid mission 'puts ASU into an elite group'


August 15, 2011

An instrument to be built in Arizona State University's School of Earth and Space Exploration "puts ASU into an elite group," says Philip Christensen, Regents Professor of Geological Sciences.

Christensen designed the instrument, a mineral scouting device, for NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission. This will launch in 2016, sending a spacecraft to orbit the asteroid 1999 RQ36 and bring back a sample of it.

The ASU instrument, dubbed OTES (short for OSIRIS-REx Thermal Emission Spectrometer), is a modified version of Christensen's highly successful Mini-TES instrument carried by both Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity.

OTES will be built in the Interdisciplinary Science and Technology Building IV on the Tempe Campus. The building is currently under construction, but when complete by this time next year, it will hold interactive displays, more than 160 labs, 60 faculty offices, and a 250-seat auditorium.

The first floor will contain cleanrooms, or rooms with low amounts of environmental contaminants, with large windows allowing visitors to see into the laboratories while the space instrument is being built.

Article source: East Valley Tribune

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