NASA to Host Live Chat on Successful Mission to Asteroid Belt

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) will host a live-streamed Science Chat at 2 p.m. EDT Friday, Sept. 7, during which experts will talk about the role of the agency’s Dawn spacecraft in studying the beginning of our solar system, and the approaching end of its 11-year mission.

The event will air live on NASA Television, Facebook Live, Ustream, YouTube and the agency’s website.

Participants include:

• Jim Green, NASA chief scientist
• Carol Raymond, Dawn principal investigator at JPL
• Marc Rayman, Dawn mission director and chief engineer at JPL

Media who would like to ask questions during the event must provide their name and affiliation to Gretchen McCartney by email at gretchen.p.mccartney@jpl.nasa.gov or by phone at 818-393-6215 or 818-287-4115.

The public can ask questions on Twitter using the hashtag #askNASA or in the comment section of the JPL Facebook page.

NASA launched Dawn in 2007 to learn more about the beginning of the solar system. During its mission, the spacecraft studied the asteroid Vesta and dwarf planet Ceres, celestial bodies believed to have formed early in the history of the solar system.

The mission aided scientists in characterizing the early solar system and the processes that dominated its formation. Dawn is the only spacecraft to orbit two deep-space destinations, a feat enabled by the efficiency of the spacecraft’s ion propulsion system.

For more information about Dawn, visit:

https://www.nasa.gov/dawn