Saw this news article today:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...th-osiris-rq36/

And didn't see a thread on this mission. There was a passing reference or two to it, and a mention here:
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.p...310#entry161310

Of this:
http://futureplanets.blogspot.com/search/l...roid%20Proposal

Which I guess I missed on vjkane's blog.

Well, we'll be hearing a lot more about this mission now.
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/solarsystem/fea...osiris-rex.html

Even though it was awe inspiring, I hope there is a lot less drama with this mission than there was with Hayabusa.

A new mission is announced the very same day Spirit officially ends her.
Makes me feel a bit less sad.

It was kind of...suggestive...that this was going to be the choice when the NF-4 mission options in the Decadal Survey included Osiris-Rex's two competitors but not Osiris itself.

The asteroid will be a getting a new name eventually, right? Any details on how/when they will choose one?

I think the planetary society will be involved.

Edit: Yes, they will be involved in the naming of the asteroid http://planetary.org/blog/article/00003047/

I vote to name it "Spirit".

What's the propulsion system? Solar-Electric Ion? I hunted and hunted, but I couldn't find anything. Given the length of the trip, that seems like the best bet, but does anyone know for sure?

--Greg

Look at the animation. It quite clearly has conventional chemical prop. The delta V requirements are not huge - this asteroid's orbit is really remarkably similar to the Earths. It's just a timing issue that defines the mission duration.

http://uanews.org/files/osiris-rex/OSIRIS-REx_Factsheet.pdf

An asteroid has already been named after Spirit.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/37452_Spirit

Yes, we were quite fortunate in the selection (or maybe I should say the public was fortunate ). We were involved in lots of the original NF proposals but I know we weren't on all of the final 3. On this one we had a deeper involvement than most. It'll be a while before the public involvement aspects of this mission take shape, but there should be a lot of fun stuff.

"MER 2" then.

Or MER-A

Or maybe Murray?

the OSIRIS-REx mission now has a good, informative website
http://osiris-rex.lpl.arizona.edu/index.html