The observation window at Goddard Space Flight Center looks out onto the world’s largest clean room, where a gleaming golden hexagon is hoisted on display — a mirror segment left over from Kenneth Harris’ most recent project.
Knowing whether an asteroid is a giant hunk of rock or a floating gravel pile—or a mix of the two—will make a big difference in strategies that researchers might devise to prevent one from striking Earth or to drill inside.
Alumnus Chris DeBoy oversees New Horizons’ Radio System, and its daily downloads from Pluto promise to shed new light on…