It's the little ones we need to keep track of, because they are harder to spot, can show up without warning and still cause damage. Asteroid sample shows just what we might need to deflect a surprise killer impactorįortunately, the big dinosaur killers are quite rare and relatively easy to spot at great distances.The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs might have created the rainforests.Some astronomers have suggested this could be the source of the object that wiped out the non-avian dinosaurs 66 million years ago. But gravitational interactions can throw them out of the asteroid belt into orbits that can cross the orbit of the Earth, posing a potentially serious threat if they hit our planet. Most asteroids are in a belt between Mars and Jupiter, and can range in size from pebbles, to tens of metres to many kilometres in diameter. These flying rocks are leftover bits from the early solar system that weren't incorporated into planets or moons, like ingredients left on the table after making a cake. Researchers conducting the Catalina Sky Survey, which is part of NASA's search for near-Earth objects, have started an online project that allows anyone, including those with no experience, to examine telescopic images of the sky to spot undiscovered asteroids. Astronomers at the University of Arizona are asking for the public's help to scan through thousands of images of the night sky to search for undiscovered asteroids - some of which have the potential to collide with Earth.
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