Ryugu, formally known as 162173 Ryugu, is a 2850-foot (870-meter) wide near-Earth asteroid that lacks a protective atmosphere. This means its surface is directly exposed to space and can gather ...

Researchers studied tiny asteroid fragments from Ryugu, revealing that it originated in the outer solar system and evolved ...

See multiple views from the Hayabusa2 spacecraft's touching down on asteroid 162173 Ryugu. Credit: JAXA/U. Tokyo/Kochi ...

Imperial College London scientists say microbes on asteroid samples from Japan's Hayabusa 2 mission have down to Earth ...

Panspermia is the hypothesis that life can survive the transfer between planetary bodies as a secondary path for life to get ...

The salt crystals, consisting of rock salt, sodium carbonate, and sodium sulfate, are crucial for understanding the evolution ...

Last year, researchers excitedly announced that they had found two organic compounds essential for living organisms in ...

Scientists have found microorganisms crawling over a sample retrieved from the 200 million-mile-distant asteroid Ryugu. But ...

A recent discovery made by scientists working with a sample of rock from outer space highlights one of the huge challenges ...

"The fact that terrestrial microbes are the Earth's best colonizers means we can never completely discount terrestrial ...

A Ryugu asteroid sample has been found contaminated by terrestrial microbes, raising questions about planetary protection.

In June 2018, Japan's Hayabusa 2 mission reached asteroid 162173 Ryugu. It studied the asteroid for about 15 months, deploying small rovers and a lander, before gathering a sample and returning it ...