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Space-Café TLV: Hayabusa2 – Asteroid Sample-Return Mission

Register here [1].

Exploration of asteroids that made our planet habitable: Hayabusa2 and JAXA small body exploration program

JAXA’s Hayabusa2 has just returned samples from Ryugu, one of the primordial asteroids. Why a primordial asteroid? Why sample return? What does it take to perform a sample return mission? Any critical decision during the mission? What’s next? These questions will be answered in the talk.

Dr. Masaki Fujimoto is Deputy Director-General of the Institute of Space and Astronautical Sciences of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (ISAS/JAXA). He joined JAXA in 2006 as a Professor of the Department of Solar System Sciences. He joined Hayabusa2 sample return capsule recovery operation in Australia (December 2020) to support the activity under COVID-19. He is also one of the founders of the Martian Moons Exploration (MMX) mission, a mission under construction to return samples from Phobos.

SpaceCafé is a community gathering for space professionals created by International Space University alums and is taking place regularly in several locations around the globe. With the help of many ISU alums, including Michael Potter, we aim to bring SpaceCafé to every city where ISU alums reside.

Ofer Lapid and Ran Livne of the Ramon Foundation, with the Israeli space agency’s support, founded SpaceCafé TLV to add Tel Aviv to the global map. We intended to introduce incoming VIPs to the local ecosystem, but since the recent events stopped most traveling, we decided to opt for a live event.