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World desk4 min

Why Scientists Study Asteroids—and Could One Hit Earth?

Asteroids preserve evidence about the solar system’s beginnings. Studying their composition and orbits also helps scientists assess impact risks and test possible defenses.
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Scientists study asteroids because they preserve clues to how the solar system formed, and because learning what near-Earth asteroids are made of and how they move helps assess impact risks. An asteroid large enough to cause widespread damage is highly unlikely to hit Earth in the next 100 years, according to NASA; that low likelihood is why continued observation and preparation matter, not a reason to expect an imminent catastrophe.

Why are asteroids scientifically valuable?

Asteroids are remnants of the material from which the solar system formed. Unlike Earth, whose earliest history has been reshaped by weathering, erosion and plate tectonics, many asteroids preserve evidence of ancient materials and processes. Examining their composition can help scientists reconstruct the conditions in which planets formed. NASA’s OSIRIS-REx FAQ describes the material gathered from Bennu as “a time capsule from the earliest days of our solar system.”

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What organic compounds can—and cannot—tell us

Some carbon-rich asteroids contain organic compounds: carbon-based chemistry relevant to studying how life’s chemical ingredients may have been distributed in the early solar system. Finding those compounds does not mean an asteroid carried life, or prove that life on Earth began in space. It gives researchers evidence for investigating possible sources of ingredients and the chemistry of early planetary environments. NASA’s analysis of Bennu samples reported carbon, nitrogen, organic matter and material altered through interactions with water and exposure to space. NASA’s 2025 account of the Bennu findings treats these as clues to the asteroid’s history and chemistry, not evidence of life.

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What did the Bennu sample-return mission reveal?

NASA chose Bennu for OSIRIS-REx because it is a carbon-rich remnant of early solar-system history and crosses Earth’s orbit, making it more accessible for a sample-return mission than many asteroids in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter. The spacecraft collected 121.6 grams (4.29 ounces) of material on October 20, 2020, and its capsule returned to Earth on September 24, 2023, according to the OSIRIS-REx FAQ.

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Bringing material to Earth lets laboratories examine it with techniques that a spacecraft’s remote instruments cannot provide. The results offer evidence about Bennu’s parent body, including its composition and its interactions with water. The sample also helps scientists investigate how organic material is distributed among small bodies in the solar system.

Bennu is useful for planetary defense as well as solar-system science. Close-up observations help researchers understand its shape, surface and the forces that affect its orbit. Better knowledge of one near-Earth asteroid can improve the physical and orbital models used when assessing other objects; Bennu is a case study, not a prediction that it is about to collide with Earth.

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Could an asteroid hit Earth?

Yes. An asteroid on an Earth-intersecting orbit could strike the planet, and the consequences would depend on factors including its size, composition, speed, impact location and the warning time available. But the existence of an impact hazard is different from an imminent threat. NASA says an impact by an asteroid large enough to cause widespread damage is highly unlikely for at least the next 100 years. That is a qualitative assessment, not a stated annual probability. NASA’s asteroid facts provides this broad outlook.

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Scientists track near-Earth objects because their orbits bring them relatively close to Earth—not because every close approach is a collision risk. NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies assesses potential impact hazards and updates calculations as additional observations improve an object’s known orbit. A temporary listing of a possible impact solution is not proof that impact will occur: further measurements can narrow uncertainty or rule out that solution. NASA outlines its monitoring and preparedness work in its Planetary Defense Overview and planetary-defense explainer.

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Bennu’s risk estimate has a long time horizon

NASA’s current OSIRIS-REx FAQ says Bennu has no chance of impact through the mid-2100s. It gives a 1-in-1,750 chance—less than one-tenth of one percent—of impact through at least the year 2300. That estimate is tied to this long window; it does not mean Bennu is likely to hit Earth soon. The same FAQ is the source for the current Bennu estimate.

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How could Earth respond to a threatening asteroid?

Planetary defense involves finding, tracking and characterizing potentially hazardous objects, coordinating preparedness and developing ways to mitigate a threat. Any response would depend on the object’s orbit and physical properties, as well as how much warning time there was. Knowing an object’s size and composition matters because a technique demonstrated on one target cannot automatically be assumed to work the same way on another.

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What NASA’s DART test demonstrated

In 2022, NASA deliberately sent the DART spacecraft into Dimorphos, a small asteroid moonlet orbiting the larger asteroid Didymos. The collision changed Dimorphos’s orbit around Didymos and shortened its orbital period by 33 minutes. NASA’s DART mission page reports this as a demonstrated kinetic-impact technique: a spacecraft strike can alter the motion of its target.

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DART was a controlled technology test, not an emergency response to an asteroid on course to hit Earth. Its result does not establish that every asteroid could be deflected, or that the same change would be achievable for a different object, size or warning period. It shows that one potential mitigation method worked on the specific target NASA tested.

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