How the Sun Protects Earth from Asteroid Impacts

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How the Sun Protects Earth from Asteroid Impacts
Asteroids are not destroyed in an impact with the Sun

Puzzling asteroid and meteor observations can now be explained.

For two decades it was thought that most near-Earth objects (NEOs) end their existence in a dramatic final plunge into the Sun. A new study published in the journal Nature finds instead that most of those objects are destroyed much farther from the Sun than previously thought.

This surprising new discovery explains several puzzling asteroid and meteor observations that have been reported in recent years.

- Initially our aim was to construct a state-of-the-art model of the NEO population that is needed for planning future asteroid surveys and spacecraft missions, says planetary scientist Mikael Granvik, currently at the University of Helsinki.

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