Video: Scientists Smash Giant Granite Balls Together to Simulate Asteroid Collisions
Two stones, each a meter in diameter, suspended from cranes Planetary science isn't all telescopes and spectral lines. Sometimes you need 40-foot cranes, advice from a dude named A-Ray, and a pair of 2,800-pound granite balls. Literal ones. Dan Durda, a research scientist at Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo., wanted to verify the mechanics of space-rock collisions, which can help explain the formation of asteroids and planets. Drawing inspiration from an artsy water fountain in Boulder, he ordered a pair of 3-foot-diameter granite balls and put them to the test. When small rocks collide, they bounce off each other like billiard balls, and physicists use mathematical models to extrapolate this rebound property to larger scales, which can help them study asteroids and planet formation processes. They use the ratio of the outgoing speed to the incoming speed in a collision, known as the coefficient of restitution. This is a measure of how...