Yesterday, a German-French probe called MASCOT began collecting valuable data from the surface of Ryugu, an asteroid located 300 million km from Earth. But it had to get cracking — the shoebox-sized probe was only expected to live for 16 hours.
NASA’s New Horizons space probe is currently speeding towards a mysterious Kuiper Belt Object known as MU69. Recent observations of the distant object indicate a very reddish surface — possibly even redder than the splotches found on Pluto.
There have been dozens of probes that have gone out exploring the solar system since 1959’s Luna 2 probe. PopChartLab has gone and noted down each one since in this beautiful poster of the Solar System.