Photographies of the Steims asteroid taken by the European sounding Rosetta
Today we left them with the photos taken from the European sounding Rosetta in its encounter with the Steins asteroid, located between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, to 360 million kilometers of the Earth.
It has diamond form and we considered the new jewel of the Solar System , has explained doctor Uwe Keller, one of the main investigators of the mission, when presenting/displaying the first images of the asteroid sent by `Rosetta'.
The data collected by the European sounding have verified that the asteroid measures 5.9 kilometers in length and 4 kilometers of stop, a size 10% greater than it was believed until now. In addition, `Rosetta' has kept awake that the surface of `Steins' has at least 23 craters, the major of which measures two kilometers.
There are shortage that the asteroid has a similar crater chain to which it can be seen in our Moon and some satellites of Jupiter , Keller declared. The scientists of THAT who have analyzed the first data sent by `Rosetta' think that the craters probably were caused in a meteorite rain, or by fragments of an asteroid greater than was broken in pieces.
The success achieved by the sounding `Rosetta' - that it has as final mission to orbit on a comet and to put a space module on his surface in 2014 - marks a new landmark in the history of the European space reconnaissance.
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