{"id":11358,"date":"2018-05-15T12:04:10","date_gmt":"2018-05-15T16:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/?p=11358"},"modified":"2018-05-15T12:31:34","modified_gmt":"2018-05-15T16:31:34","slug":"asteroid-architecture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/2018\/05\/asteroid-architecture\/","title":{"rendered":"Asteroid Architecture"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Charles<\/a>
Image by Will Kirk \/ Homewood Photography; Digitized Asteroid Image courtesy of Charles El Mir<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Space is sprinkled with the rocky detritus known as asteroids. In our own solar system, tens of thousands of these stone masses are clustered in the asteroid belt that lies between Mars and Jupiter.<\/p>\n

Asteroids represent both danger and promise, explains Charles El Mir<\/strong>, a PhD candidate in the laboratory of K.T. Ramesh<\/a>, director of the Hopkins Extreme Materials Institute<\/a> and the Alonzo G. Decker Jr. Chair of Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins. Having one headed toward our planet might seem the stuff of movie drama, but that is actually a plausible scenario that scientists are actively preparing for. In addition, as humans explore deeper into space, asteroids could harbor key resources\u2014such as water\u2014that could potentially be extracted. Drilling into their interiors could help space explorers avoid having to pack everything for a long spaceflight.<\/p>\n

Both of these circumstances will require researchers to have a better understanding of asteroids, particularly their varied structures, El Mir says. Knowing whether an asteroid is a giant hunk of rock or a floating gravel pile\u2014or a mix of the two\u2014will make a big difference in strategies that researchers might devise to prevent one from striking Earth or to drill inside.<\/p>\n

To help decipher asteroids\u2019 architectures, El Mir\u2019s research focuses on learning more about both length and time scales.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome asteroids are hundreds of kilometers across, and their structure might change over thousands of years or at the moment of impact. We\u2019re trying to figure out something you could never replicate in a lab. That\u2019s why my lab is our big computational cluster, a group of computers working together,\u201d he says, referring to the Maryland Advanced Research Computing Center<\/a>, jointly operated by Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland, College Park.<\/p>\n

Using MARCC, El Mir has spent part of his efforts studying thermal fatigue, the stress that repeated fluctuations in temperature put on an object. Because asteroids have a period of rotation that lasts for just a few hours, they\u2019re turning toward and away from the sun in relatively quick succession, heating and cooling their surfaces. The expansion and contraction caused by these temperature changes could make them break down over time.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s devoted another part of his studies to what happens in the hours after a large impact, modeling how material might be expelled but still interact with the asteroid\u2019s gravitational field.<\/p>\n

El Mir, whose work is funded by NASA’s Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute<\/a>, hopes to continue researching topics far from Earth-bound as he continues in his career. \u201cWe\u2019re still at the very early stages of space exploration,\u201d he says. \u201cI feel that there\u2019s no better challenge than outer space. I want to keep exploring.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Knowing whether an asteroid is a giant hunk of rock or a floating gravel pile\u2014or a mix of the two\u2014will make a big difference in strategies that researchers might devise to prevent one from striking Earth or to drill inside.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":11231,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[3123,3118,3113,3108,3103,1999,1158,808,190,185,156],"class_list":["post-11358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-students","tag-solar-system-exploration-research-virtual-institute","tag-time-scales","tag-thermal-fatigue","tag-asteroid","tag-charles-el-mir","tag-k-t-ramesh","tag-johns-hopkins-university","tag-hopkins-extreme-materials-institute","tag-maryland-advanced-research-computing-center","tag-nasa","tag-department-of-mechanical-engineering","issue-summer-2018"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAsteroid Architecture - JHU Engineering Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/2018\/05\/asteroid-architecture\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Asteroid Architecture - JHU Engineering Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Knowing whether an asteroid is a giant hunk of rock or a floating gravel pile\u2014or a mix of the two\u2014will make a big difference in strategies that researchers might devise to prevent one from striking Earth or to drill inside.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/2018\/05\/asteroid-architecture\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"JHU Engineering Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-05-15T16:04:10+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2018-05-15T16:31:34+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/El-mir-collage_THUMB.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"300\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Abby Lattes\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Abby Lattes\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"NewsArticle\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/engineering.jhu.edu\\\/magazine-archive\\\/2018\\\/05\\\/asteroid-architecture\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/engineering.jhu.edu\\\/magazine-archive\\\/2018\\\/05\\\/asteroid-architecture\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Abby Lattes\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/engineering.jhu.edu\\\/magazine-archive\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/0244393be370fbc3ead8ec26062e9742\"},\"headline\":\"Asteroid Architecture\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-05-15T16:04:10+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-05-15T16:31:34+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/engineering.jhu.edu\\\/magazine-archive\\\/2018\\\/05\\\/asteroid-architecture\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":482,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/engineering.jhu.edu\\\/magazine-archive\\\/2018\\\/05\\\/asteroid-architecture\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/engineering.jhu.edu\\\/magazine-archive\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2018\\\/05\\\/El-mir-collage_THUMB.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute\",\"Time Scales\",\"Thermal Fatigue\",\"Asteroid\",\"Charles El Mir\",\"K.T. 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