images

The Stardust probe and comet Wild 2 - Artist view

by

Illustration Grégoire Cirade/Novapix

Reference

e-son30-01503

Date

2009-07-16

Stardust is an interplanetary spacecraft, whose primary purpose was to investigate the makeup of the comet Wild 2 and its coma. It was launched on February 07 1999 and returned to Earth on January 15 2006. It is the first sample return mission to collect cosmic dust and return the sample to Earth ; the capsule contains cometary and interstellar samples gathered by the Stardust spacecraft.