NASA Psyche Mission: Charting a Metallic World

In this illustration, an asteroid named Psyche, which provides a special insight into the elements that go into planet formation, is depicted as a metallic globe. NASA's Psyche mission will take off in 2023 and land on the asteroid Psyche in 2026. Psyche circles the Sun between Mars and Jupiter. The Psyche-named spacecraft will orbit the asteroid for 21 months while surveying it and analysing its characteristics. Principal Investigator Lindy Elkins-Tanton of Arizona State University is in charge of the mission. The mission's general management, system engineering, integration and test, and mission operations are all handled by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. A high-power solar electric propulsion spaceship chassis is being offered by Maxar Technologies.