Don Brownlee
Don Brownlee
formed hot major planets pluto regions solar sun system thrown
There are two major possibilities. One that they formed in the innermost, hotter-most regions of our solar system when the sun and planets were forming, and they were thrown out -- all the way out to the Pluto region of the solar system. The other possibility is they were formed around other stars, in hot regions around other stars.
comet delivered exciting opening seeing
The real exciting thing will be opening the canister and seeing what the comet delivered to us.
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It felt like the whole thing was on the verge of disaster. There was this guy with his finger on a button to blow the vehicle up if it went off range. ... No one said anything for minutes.
fire found remarkably samples solar
Remarkably enough, we have found fire and ice. We have found samples in the coldest part of the solar system.
believe comet mission older particles
Our mission is called Stardust, in part because we believe some of the particles in the comet will, in fact, be older than the sun.
almost contain electron identify microscope minerals questions
We'll be able to say some things almost instantly. One of the big questions is do comets contain minerals that contain water, called hydrated silicates and under an electron microscope you can identify those practically instantly.
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People all over world will be able to analyze them down to a single atomic scale.
history written
Our history is written at the submicron level, in these interstellar grains.
almost billion grabbed incredible landed miles piece traveled visited
We traveled almost 3 billion miles in space. We visited a comet, grabbed a piece of it, and it landed here this morning. It's an incredible thrill.
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What we want to know is how organic molecules actually form in comets and whether they helped deliver organic material to the Earth before life began.
collected considered extremely form found high minerals normally siberia solar
We found mineral grains that are considered very high-temperature minerals -- they normally form under extremely high temperature conditions. And yet they were collected in a comet, the Siberia of the solar system.
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We've undergone a very heavy level of scrutiny by review boards because of Genesis and because of the Columbia accident. . . . It was a cultural shift in NASA, that you're now required to understand all the risks.
starting work
We're just starting to work on this ... it will take years to analyze.
analysis bringing collected comet home samples
We have successfully collected samples from the comet and we're bringing them home for analysis in laboratories all over the world.