NASA Probe May Have Found Interstellar Dust

NASA's Stardust spacecraft may have brought interstellar dust back to Earth.

Stardust, which was launched to gather material from the comet Wild 2, contained a retractable device, known as the Stardust Interstellar Dust Collector (SIDC) for collecting interstellar dust. The SIDC was filled with aerogel, a material that traps dust molecules.

A sample was returned to Earth in January 2006, when NASA launched an internet application known as Stardust @Home, which invited users to look for particles of dust in the collection medium.

The first person to find what might be an interstellar dust particle using Stardust@Home was Bruce Hudson, a Canadian, who named the particle that he found "Orion".

Scientists later found a second possible dust particle, which was named "Sirius."

Interstellar dust forms when the gas that is ejected from starts condenses.

It carries the heavy atoms from which our Solar System was made.

Scientists have not yet confirmed that these really are interstellar dust particles.

Stardust has since moved on to a new mission, studying the comet Tempel 1.