Lucy and Donaldjohanson share a special bond.

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The real time status of communications with our deep space explorers

Asteroid Donaldjohanson has turned out to be a picturesque waypoint as NASA’s mission heads toward Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids.

When considering the unnamed major features of all the moons, asteroids, and comets in our solar system there are still a lot of places out there that need proper names. That means the International Astronomical Union (IAU), the non-governmental body responsible for naming astronomical objects, has its work cut out for them. Recently they tackled a relatively easy challenge by approving a series of names on the asteroid Donaldjohnson, the first and only target of NASA’s Lucy mission in the main asteroid belt. With those names come a whole new way to talk about one of the asteroids that humanity has studied most closely thus far.

La Dosis Diaria · Episode

When considering the unnamed major features of all the moons, asteroids, and comets in our solar system there are still a lot of places out there that need proper names. That means the International Astronomical Union (IAU), the non-governmental body responsible for naming astronomical objects, has its work cut out for them. Recently they tackled a relatively easy challenge by approving a series of names on the asteroid Donaldjohnson, the first and only target of NASA’s Lucy mission in the main asteroid belt. With those names come a whole new way to talk about one of the asteroids that humanity has studied most closely thus far.

The perception that Boris Johnson is a Trump-style leader...

NASA's Lucy spacecraft, on its way to Jupiter's Trojan asteroids, has its next target in its sights: the main belt asteroid 52246 Donaldjohanson. Currently 45 million miles (70 million kilometers) from the two-mile-wide (3.2-kilometer-wide) Donaldjohanson, Lucy's high-resolution camera L'LORRI (Lucy Long Range Reconnaissance Imager) spotted the asteroid moving against a background of stars. Lucy will continue to track Donaldjohanson, adjusting its trajectory to ensure an accurate flyby on April 20, when the spacecraft will come within 596 miles (960 kilometers) of the asteroid, which orbits in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.