A paper co-authored by New Mexico Tech researchers from the Magdalena Ridge Observatory 2.4-meter telescope, Drs. William Ryan and Eileen Ryan, is now published on the journal Nature’s website. The publication, titled “Orbital Period Change of Dimorphos Due to the DART Kinetic Impact,” is the second in a series of publications about NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft intentionally collided into the asteroid Dimorphos on Sept. 26, 2022.

The DART mission employed an asteroid-deflection technique known as a “kinetic impactor,” in this case, smashing a spacecraft into an asteroid. From the data, the DART investigation team, led by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, found that a kinetic impactor mission like DART can be effective in altering the trajectory of an asteroid, a big step toward the goal of preventing future asteroid strikes on Earth.

READ THE PAPER ON THE NATURE WEBSITE