One particular space rock, asteroid Ryugu, has become a focal point for researchers eager to unlock its mysteries. Thanks to the efforts of Japanese spacecraft Hayabusa2, we now have an ...

Japan has landed two hopping robots onto asteroid Ryugu as part of the Hayabusa2 mission. It's Japan's second mission to an asteroid, where it plans to return some samples of Ryugu to Earth by the ...

Samples taken from the space-returned piece of asteroid Ryugu were collected and prepared under strict anti-contamination controls. Inside the cleanest of clean rooms, a tiny particle was ...

Scientists found that asteroid Bennu contained a set of salty mineral deposits that formed in an exact sequence when a brine evaporated, leaving clues about the type of water that flowed billions of ...

The asteroid Ryugu used to pass far closer to the sun, even closer than Mercury, an analysis of images shot by Japan's Hayabusa 2 space probe reveals. The probe snapped the images of the asteroid ...

The Japan Aerospace and Exploration Agency has done two asteroid sample-return missions, to the asteroids Itokawa and Ryugu. Special delivery! Biggest-ever haul of asteroid dust and rock returns ...

Researchers have found more than 20 different amino acids, the building blocks of life, in soil samples Japan’s Hayabusa 2 space probe brought back from the asteroid Ryugu, according to sources.

A movie captured by Japan's Hayabusa-2 spacecraft shows the moment it touched down on an asteroid. The probe was attempting to grab a sample of rock from the 1km-wide body known as Ryugu ...

"In previous research, uracil and nicotinic acid were detected in the samples from asteroid Ryugu, but the other four nucleobases were absent. The difference in abundance and complexity of N ...