OSIRIS-APEX
After making history as the first U.S. mission to bring a piece of an asteroid back to Earth, the OSIRIS-REx mission has transitioned to OSIRIS-APEX. The spacecraft is now scheduled to rendezvous with a stony asteroid called Apophis, which is thought to be very different from the OSIRIS-REx target Bennu. Scientists hope to further enrich our understanding of the solar system and potentially hazardous asteroids.
Mission Overview
On Sept. 24, 2023, the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft swung by Earth to deliver a sample from the near-Earth asteroid Bennu. Now, the spacecraft is flying under a new name – OSIRIS-APEX, short for OSIRIS-APophis EXplorer. NASA extended the University of Arizona-led mission so that scientists can study the near-Earth asteroid Apophis for 18 months after the asteroid's close approach to Earth on April 13, 2029.
Having already investigated Bennu – a carbon-rich asteroid – the spacecraft will now provide first-of-its-kind high-resolution data of a different class of near-Earth object – a stony asteroid. The spacecraft made its first maneuver toward Apophis when it diverted from the Earth immediately after delivering the Bennu sample.
Following sample delivery, the original mission team split in two. Half of the team remained on OSIRIS-REx to analyze the Bennu sample, while the others transitioned to the OSIRIS-APEX mission. Dani DellaGiustina, a University of Arizona planetary sciences assistant professor and OSIRIS-REx deputy principal investigator, is now principal investigator of OSIRIS-APEX.
News About the Mission
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Dani Mendoza DellaGiustina
Principal Investigator
Dani DellaGiustina is the principal investigator for OSIRIS-APEX and an assistant professor of planetary science in the University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory. Her research interests include the surface and near-surface structure of small airless worlds across the solar system. She is especially interested in water distribution through the solar system. For her investigations, she develops and uses remote-sensing and geophysical instruments deployed by spacecraft. She also tests and validates instrumentation techniques in extreme Earth environments that are similar to landscapes on other worlds.
Michael Nolan
Deputy Principal Investigator
Michael Nolan is a research professor at the University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and the deputy principal investigator of the OSIRIS-APEX mission. His primary responsibility is organizing the OSIRIS-APEX science team. His research focuses on the physical processes of asteroid evolution and their connection to meteorites. From 2006 to 2015, he led the Planetary Radar Program at the Arecibo Observatory and uses that data to better understand the processes that affect asteroid evolution.
Anjani Polit
Deputy Principal Investigator
Anjani Polit manages instrument operations and spacecraft observation planning and oversees daily operations at the mission's Science Processing and Operations Center for OSIRIS-APEX. She also provides management oversight for science operations and science team finances, scheduling and resource allocation. Anjani previously worked as the mission implementation systems engineer for the OSIRIS-REx and was the uplink operations lead for the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
Dathon Golish
Mission Instrument and Observation Scientist
Dathon Golish leads the OSIRIS-APEX observation planning team in coordination with instrument scientists, science team members and spacecraft engineers. He is responsible for ensuring that instrument observations meet the mission scientific objectives at the asteroid. He also manages required calibrations and subsequent analyses with instrument scientists to ensure the continued health and fidelity of the OSIRIS-APEX scientific payloads. His research interests have spanned a range of topics over 15 years in instrument design, imaging and image processing.
Bashar Rizk
OCAMS Instrument Scientist
Bashar Rizk is the instrument scientist for OCAMS, OSIRIS-APEX's primary scientific imaging system. His main responsibility is overseeing OCAMS operation to ensure it produces valid data. He has worked as an applied physicist in a university research and development setting for over 40 years. Thirty-five of those years have been at the University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, working on spacecraft and remote sensing system design, development, testing, calibration, planning and operations, as well as data processing and analysis.
Rose Garcia
Deputy OCAMS Instrument Scientist
Rose Garcia is the OCAMS deputy instrument scientist for OSIRIS-APEX. Her duties include assisting in planning instrument campaigns; overseeing instrument performance and calibrations; assessing and validating observational data; and supporting contingency strategies during unexpected events or anomalies. She previously was an observational astronomer for the Catalina Sky Survey and formed part of the team tasked with planning the science observations of Bennu with OSIRIS-REx.
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