[meteorite-list] NASA Prepares For Arrival Of Comet Samples To Houston (Stardust)

[Ron Baalke]

http://www.spacedaily.com/news/comet-05zp.html

NASA Prepares For Arrival Of Comet Samples To Houston
SpaceDaily
October 17, 2005

Houston (SPX) - Particles gathered near a comet in deep space that 
are due to arrive at NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC), Houston, in 
January may help scientists better understand comets and their role 
in the early solar system.

NASA's Stardust spacecraft, which collected particles from comet Wild 2
in January 2004, will complete its two-year, 708-million-mile trek back
to Earth in January 2006. The capsule will be transported to JSC and
stored in the Stardust Laboratory  where scientists will make the
first analyses of freshly collected cometary and interstellar particles.

Stardust recovery and science  team members met at JSC the week of
Oct. 3-7 to rehearse the steps that will be involved in recovering the
samples from the Stardust capsule. A canister was transported to JSC and
placed in the Stardust clean room.

There, scientists removed the Stardust sample trays and rehearsed
techniques they will use to document, process and analyze the cometary
and interstellar particles.

"The spacecraft recovery team and the mission science team were at JSC
all week to shake down procedures for opening the sample canister and
harvesting and analyzing the captured samples," said Mike Zolensky,
Stardust co- investigator and NASA space scientist in JSC's
Astromaterials Research and Exploration Science Directorate.

The Stardust spacecraft was launched in February 1999. It encountered
its target, comet Wild 2, on Jan. 2, 2004. In addition to capturing
samples of cometary material for return to Earth, Stardust collected
grains from a stream of particles from interstellar space.

The spacecraft will release a capsule containing the sample particles
for landing at the Air Force's Utah Test and Training Range early Jan.
15, 2006.