Suspected asteroid collision. Space telescope image of the comet-like object P/2010 A2 (white speck, lower left) with a mysterious X-shaped debris pattern and trailing streamers of dust that suggest a head-on collision between two asteroids. The most likely interpretation of this data suggests that two small and previously unknown asteroids recently collided, creating a shower of debris that is being swept back into a tail from the collision site by the pressure of sunlight. The main nucleus of P/2010 A2 would be the surviving remnant of this so-called hypervelocity collision. Imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3). (KEYSTONE/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/NASA, ESA, and D. Jewitt (University of California, Los Angeles) /SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY)
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KEYSTONE
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SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY SPL
Byline
NASA, ESA, AND D. JEWITT (UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES)
NASA, ESA, AND D. JEWITT (UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES)
238005580
SUSPECTED ASTEROID COLLISION
NASA, ESA, AND D. JEWITT (UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES)
238005560
SUSPECTED ASTEROID COLLISION
NASA, ESA, AND D. JEWITT (UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES)
237854995
SUSPECTED ASTEROID COLLISION
NASA, ESA, AND D. JEWITT (UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES)
237854980
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