Kamo’oalewa: Near Earth Asteroid

• Recently, scientists have observed a quasi-satellite named Kamo`oalewa, tracking the Earth’s orbit around the Sun which could be a fragment from the moon.
• A mission to collect Kamo’oalewa’s samples has been scheduled for a launch in 2025.

Kamo’oalewa:

• Discovered in 2016 (through the PanSTARRS telescope in Hawaii), Kamo’oalewa is a word that is part of a Hawaiian chant, and alludes to an offspring that travels on its own.
• It is one of Earth’s quasi-satellites, a space rock that orbits the Sun, but remains relatively close to the planet – in this case about 9 million miles away.
• The asteroid is roughly the size of a Ferris wheel – between 150 and 190 feet in diameter.
• Because of its small size (about 50 metres wide), this quasi-satellite has been difficult for scientists to study, and little was known about it so far.

Findings-Three Possibilities

Part of Earth Moon

• It could have broken away from the Moon due to a possible impact, and gone on to orbit the Sun rather than the Earth-like its parent does.
• Spectrum of reflected light from Kamo’oalewa closely matched lunar rocks from Nasa’s Apollo missions, suggesting it originated from the moon.
• It is in an unusual orbit, one that would be unlikely for objects that had drifted towards Earth from the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

Near Earth Objects

• Captured in its Earth-like orbit from the general population of Near Earth Objects.

Earth’s Trojan Asteroids:

• It originated from an as-yet-undiscovered quasi-stable population of Earth’s Trojan asteroids (Trojans are a group of asteroids that share an orbit with a larger planet).

Terminology :

• Asteroid: A relatively small, inactive, rocky body orbiting the Sun.
• Comet: A relatively small, at times active, object whose ices can vaporize in sunlight forming an atmosphere (coma) of dust and gas and, sometimes, a tail of dust and/or gas.
• Meteoroid: A small particle from a comet or asteroid orbiting the Sun.
• Meteor: The light phenomena which results when a meteoroid enters the Earth’s atmosphere and vaporizes; a shooting star.
• Meteorite: A meteoroid that survives its passage through the Earth’s atmosphere and lands upon the Earth’s surface.