The asteroid Dinkinesh

The asteroid Dinkinesh, also known as 1999 HU3, is a space object orbiting the Sun in our solar system.

It was discovered on 18 April 1999 by the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) programme in Socorro, New Mexico. It was named after "Dinkinesh", which means "you are wonderful" in Amharic, the Ethiopian language. This name is a reference to the famous hominid fossil known as "Lucy", whose full name is "Australopithecus afarensis" and which was discovered in Ethiopia in 1974.

The asteroid has an estimated diameter of about 1.7 kilometres and is located in the asteroid belt, a region of the solar system that stretches between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

These asteroids are remnants of the formation of the solar system and provide valuable information about the history and composition of our solar system.

The exact composition of the asteroid is still unknown, but it is believed to be composed mainly of rock and metal.

The study of asteroids like Dinkinesh helps us to better understand planetary formation processes and the evolution of solar systems in general.

Although the Dinkinesh asteroid does not pose a significant impact threat to Earth, its study is important to better understand the dynamics of asteroids and how they might affect our planet in the future.

The Lucy space probe, launched by NASA in 2021, is currently within 7.6 million kilometres of this asteroid and is scheduled to pass within 425 kilometres of it and conduct studies on this and 7 other asteroids.