The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array or ALMA telescope in Chile recently captured the highest resolution of wavelength emission imaging from an asteroid known as 16 Psyche. NASA has been studying this asteroid for some time now, and in the year 2026, it is expected to pass through Earth. The captured image of the asteroid will serve as an addition to the ongoing research regarding the asteroid, as experts theorize that the asteroid 16 Psyche is a part of a bigger celestial body, specifically, a planet.
16 Psyche's Highest Resolution Image Ever
Astronomy experts will pursue to understand more about the 16 Psyche and its intriguing surface temperature. They believe that the measurements observed from the asteroid will give us a hint about its origin. It was initially theorized that 16 Psyche is somehow part of a planet or a core of a young planet that had failed to develop. However, there was still no evidence that is strong enough to prove the asteroid's original form. The study was published in The Planetary Science Journal, titled "The Surface of (16) Psyche from Thermal Emission and Polarization Mapping."
16 Psyche orbits our sun, too, right inside the asteroid belt that contains millions of celestial rocks that expand from a range of 10 meters to over 900 kilometers. 16 Psyche was the largest M-Type asteroid recorded from the belt, scaling to over 200 kilometers.
M-Type asteroids are known to contain abundant metal and other planetary materials. Even M-type asteroids are theorized to be a core of a planet that has attempted to develop during the formation of our solar system but unfortunately failed.
What Is Thermal Emission?
Thermal observation, which was the same method to capture the temperature of 16 Psyche, is known to be one of the most challenging processes to image distant celestial bodies throughout space. The measurements used to gather data from thermal observations techniques, like the ALMA telescope, are read from light emissions instead of the radiation that the sun projects. Pixels revealed from these measurements can be at a minimum but can be very detailed evidence. In the case of 16 Psyche's observation, a high-resolution thermal reading is a gold mine.
Thermal inertia is a key to why emissions from distinct asteroids vary. This property refers to how fast the asteroid heats up in contact with the sun and cools down in dark regions. Thermal inertia readings correlate to the materials found on the surface of asteroids. Low thermal and high thermal inertia usually have dust or rocks, respectively.
ALMA telescope was used to determine the thermal emission of 16 Psyche. The telescope system uses an array of over 60 radio detectors in mapping celestial emissions, and this same method was used to read the thermal properties of the 16 Psyche asteroid. The image captured has a pixel of about 30 by 30 kilometers.
The study found that the 16 Psyche asteroid is composed of a uniquely dense and conductive surface. According to a report by SlashGear, the formation of the asteroid's surface explains why 16 Psyche is giving off abnormally high temperatures as opposed to the normal emission of a typical asteroid.
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