China all set to launch an asteroid mining robot in November

What might be a significant milestone in space exploration, a China start-up is all set to send a ‘space mining robot’ in November. According to a report by IEEE, Beijing-based private space resources company called Origin Space has even taken initial steps towards testing capabilities in a bid to identify and extract the off-Earth resources. 

Weighing nearly 30 grams, the NEO-1 satellite is designed to enter a 500-kilometre-altitude sun-synchronous orbit and will be launch by a Chinese Long March series rocket as a secondary payload. Even though the tiny robot will not perform actual mining at the space it would be testing technologies.

An Origin Space co-founder, Yu Tianhong was quoted by the media outlet saying that the main goal of the entire venture is to demonstrate the several functions including spacecraft orbital manoeuvre along with ‘intelligent’ spacecraft identification and control. Because such a mission has never been conducted before, the outcome or the potential progress still remains subject to several speculations. However, if successful, the space mining robot could reportedly give birth to a trillion-dollar industry. 

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NEO-2 involves lunar landing

The 2017-established Beijing company is reportedly even eying 2021 or 2022 for a NEO-2 mission involving a landing on the Moon. Even though the Origin Space co-founder has informed that the project is still in process of completion, he assured that it would include a lunar landing through an indirect journey. 

Apart from this, another mission Yuanwang-1 or Look up-1 which is nicknamed as ‘Little Hubble’ is also scheduled to take place in 2021. The deal for the development of the satellite has been reportedly signed with a subsidiary of China’s main state-owned space contractor CASC. 

Meanwhile, NASA is also on its way to perform a separate historic mission on October 20 when its robotic OSIRIS-REx spacecraft will touch down on asteroid Bennu’s surface for a few seconds for collecting rock samples and dust. This is the first time NASA will attempt to grab pieces of an asteroid, which will be returned to Earth for study.

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