UAE completes probe for collision with asteroid Justicia in 2035 — Nature
The United Arab Emirates has completed the development of a 10-kilogram probe for the Emirates Mission to the Asteroid Belt. In 2035, it is expected to collide with the reddish asteroid Justicia, Nature reports.
Launch scheduled for 2028
The probe was designed and built in the UAE. It will now be delivered to the University of Colorado Boulder, where partners will integrate it with the main MBR Explorer spacecraft. The mission is scheduled to launch in March 2028.
MBR Explorer is set to study six asteroids using cameras and spectrometers that enable remote analysis of material composition. The spacecraft will also observe Venus and Mars before sending the small probe to Justicia.
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What is known about Justicia
Justicia is located between Mars and Jupiter. Its unusual red color may indicate the presence of materials more characteristic of more distant regions of the Solar System. Elias Tsoutsanis, principal investigator at the Propulsion and Space Research Center of the Technology Innovation Institute in Abu Dhabi, noted that if the asteroid originated in the outer regions of the Solar System and later moved closer, it could provide information about the formation of the Solar System and the origin of water.
This will be the UAE's second interplanetary mission after the Hope orbiter, which reached Mars in 2021 following six years of development. Najwa Aaraj, head of the Technology Innovation Institute, said that the creation of the probe demonstrates the country's growing self-reliance in space science and technology: unlike Hope, whose components were created in cooperation with partners, the UAE developed the probe for the new mission independently.
Ahmed Belhoul Al Falasi, head of the UAE Space Agency, said that after the Mars mission was announced in 2014, the number of students enrolling in STEM fields increased by 30%. According to him, between 2015 and 2025, the number of UAE universities offering aerospace engineering and space science programs approximately doubled.
