Asteroid that orbits near Earth may have come from the moon
CBSN
The origins of a certain near-Earth asteroid — about the size of a Ferris wheel — has stumped scientists for years. Now, astronomers believe the asteroid called Kamo`oalewa broke off from the moon, according to data published in the journal Nature on Thursday.
A team of astronomers, led by Ben Sharkey, a University of Arizona planetary sciences graduate student, discovered the asteroid in 2016. They found that Kamo`oalewa's "spectrum," or pattern of reflected light, didn't match any of the other near-Earth asteroids. They knew something was different about Kamo`oalewa — whose name is found in a Hawaiian creation chant and "alludes to an offspring that travels on its own," according to a press release from the astronomers — but the team only had a few weeks to run tests before the asteroid continued on it's orbit.
"We doubted ourselves to death," Vishnu Reddy, Sharkey's co-author and University of Arizona associate professor of lunar and planetary sciences, said in the press release.