Piece of pristine asteroid gives Field Museum scientists a look billions of years into the past

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By CBS Chicago Team

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    CHICAGO (WBBM) — Scientists at the Field Museum can now get a glimpse of 4.5 billion years into the past.

This is because the museum is the new temporary home to a tiny piece of a pristine asteroid.

The little black fragment came from the near-Earth asteroid called Bennu.

NASA launched a mission in 2016 to retrieve samples of the asteroid and brought them back two years ago. Now, scientists at the Field Museum will use a scanning electron microscope to get an up-close look at the tiny piece.

“We believe Bennu contains part of the ingredients for life and part of the ingredients of the formation of Earth,” Dr. Phillipp Heck said.

Unlike a meteorite, the asteroid’s fragments are pristine, meaning they are uncontaminated by the Earth’s atmosphere.

The sample won’t be on display, but the Field Museum is home to one of the largest collections of meteorites in the world.

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