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Painted Stone: asteroids and asteroid mining

Painted Stone, a piece by composer/astrophysicist Alex Parker. This shows 100,000 asteroids identified by the Sloan Digital Sky survey. (In Fall 2016, the number is now up to 200,000.) The so-called Trojan asteroids that lead, and lag, Jupiter by 60 degrees on its orbit are clearly visible once you get to see the whole collection of objects.

Why is this important? The asteroids might be a source of resources, and a way to fuel our exploration of space. Here’s a short video by the company Planetary Resources, which is hoping to commercialize asteroid mining. (No endorsement is implied here. The following is just a good short video explaining the ‘why’ of asteroid mining.)