On September 24, 2023, the OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, and Security – Regolith Explorer) mission swung by Earth to drop off a historic piece of cargo: a sample from the asteroid Bennu. This marked the first time a U.S. space mission returned samples from an asteroid to Earth. Data from Bennu samples are some of the latest additions to the NASA Planetary Science Division’s open archive for laboratory analyses of planetary samples: the Astromaterials Data System (Astromat). 

In addition to Bennu data, Astromat’s offerings include analyses of lunar samples, meteorites, and cosmic dust, as well as data from the JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) Hayabusa mission. The Hayabusa mission returned samples from asteroid Itokawa on June 13, 2010. A central component of Astromat is its data synthesis search feature, which allows users to pull data from across 40+ years of scientific publications about specific types of targets. The data synthesis service includes online tools to help search, mine, and retrieve the content. 

NASA’s Science Mission Directorate fosters a culture of open science to enhance scientific discovery. Astromat’s open data offerings align with this commitment. Explore open data in Astromat here.