ISSUE 136, MARCH 2014 2 Curating NASA’S Extraterrestrial Samples Continued
Curating NASA’s Extraterrestrial Samples — Carlton Allen and the Astromaterials Curation Team, NASA Johnson Space Center Note from the Editors: This article is the second in a series of reports describing the history and current activities of NASA’s planetary research facilities worldwide. — Paul Schenk and Renée Dotson Rock and dust samples from many solar system objects have made their way to Earth, either via spacecraft missions (manned and unmanned), or by simply falling to Earth’s surface from deep space. Curation of such extraterrestrial samples is the critical interface between sample return missions and the international research community. Curation includes documentation, preservation, physical security, Lpreparation, and allocation of samples for research, education, and public outreach. The NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas, is responsible for curating NASA’s seven collections of extraterrestrial samples. These collections comprise lunar rocks and soils collected by the Apollo astronauts, meteorites collected in Antarctica, cosmic dust collected by aircraft, solar wind atoms collected by the Genesis spacecraft, comet particles collected by the Stardust spacecraft, interstellar dust particles collected by Stardust, and asteroid surface particles collected by the Hayabusa spacecraft. The curators of these collections have developed specialized laboratories and procedures to preserve and protect the samples, meet current research needs, and support studies into the indefinite future. This suite of laboratories is unique in the world. A subset of each collection is maintained at a secure facility remote Pfrom JSC, ensuring that entire collections are not lost in the event of a disaster. Instructions for requesting samples, as well as catalogs, newsletters, images, and research results, are available online at curator.jsc.nasa.gov.
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