How does the OSIRIS-REx mission return asteroid samples?

The OSIRIS-REx mission brings back tiny pieces of an asteroid like a kid grabs a handful of candy from a bag.

Imagine you're at a candy store with your favorite bag of gummy worms. You don’t need all the candies, just grab a few to take home and share with friends. That’s what OSIRIS-REx does, but instead of gummy worms, it grabs tiny rocks from an asteroid called Bennu.

The spacecraft has a special tool called the Sample Return Capsule, which is like a mini vacuum cleaner. When it gets close to the asteroid, it touches the surface and uses soft brushes to scoop up small pieces of rock, just like how you might use your hand to grab a few candies from a bag.

Once the rocks are inside the capsule, they’re safely stored until the spacecraft heads back to Earth. After traveling through space for a while, it drops the capsule into the Earth’s atmosphere, where it lands like a hot-air balloon in a lake, gently and safely so we can pick up the samples and study them.

It's not magic, it’s just a clever way of grabbing a little piece of space to bring back home.