Investigating the composition of primitive asteroids through samples from NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission

Emma's PhD project is to work with the Oxford OSIRIS-REx team to analyse samples from asteroid Bennu. The first project will be in collaboration with OSIRIS-REx Spectroscopy Sample Analysis Working Group, comprising team members from the US (e.g. Brown University, SWRI, NASA's Johnson Space Center, University of Arizona) and Canada (Univ. Winnipeg) and the team at National History Museum in London.

The specific aims of the project are to compare, using infrared spectroscopy, allocations of the returned sample to analogue materials including meteorites and terrestrial samples. These spectra will then be compared to the remote sensing data collected by the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft at Bennu to provide a wider geological context for the sample. This will help answer wider questions about the possible parent bodies for primitive asteroids by comparing the spatially resolved remote sensing data from OSIRIS-REx with the point spectra from ground and space-based telescopes.

The project will consider the thermal environment on the asteroid and how this may affect the spectra measured in the lab from those at Bennu, with application to other small bodies in the Solar System (e.g. being measured by JWST). The research will consider wavelengths >25 um as this is a unique capability for our spectroscopy setup compared with other members of the Spectroscopy Sample Analysis Working group.

This project falls within the STFC remit for planetary science and extra-terrestrial sample analysis.