Technological importance of asteroid mining

Year 2021, Volume: 4 Issue: 2, 63 - 68, 26.12.2021

Senem Çabuk , Nazım Çabuk

https://doi.org/10.46239/ejbcs.793540

Cited By: 1

Abstract

With the ever-growing demands of the population and the ever-growing world of consumption and technology, the resources of the planet Earth are limited. According to Cohen (2007), some of the Earth's major resources, such as metals and minerals needed to develop the technology and food industries, may be depleted within the next 40-50 years, based on known terrestrial reserves and increased consumption. For industrial and technological development of humanity, new discoveries are needed in future realization as well as future discoveries. Asteroids are celestial bodies of scientific importance to reveal the formation, chemical composition and evolution of the Solar System. As the name implies, "Near Earth Asteroids", metal have been found to be potentially close to possible because they are sufficiently close and can be found in precious metals and minerals. The reservoirs of important substances such as water, metals and semiconductors can be found in these celestial bodies. Although the Asteroids and the Earth are composed of the same elements, the Earth's relatively stronger gravity has attracted all the heavy elements to its core over time. An asteroid rain deprived of such valuable elements results in the formation of gold, cobalt, iron, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, osmium, palladium, platinum, rhenium, radium, ruthenium and tungsten elements (from the core to the surface). Today, these metals are extracted from the Earth's crust and are required for economic and technological advancements. Therefore, the geological history of the Earth can be a very good step for the future of asteroid mining.

Keywords

asteroid mining, asteroid categories, REEs, technology, metals, C-type, S-type, M-type, PGMs, NEAs, valuable asteroids

Thanks

I would like to thank my valuable supervisor Assoc. Dr. Kutluay YÜCE, who helped with her vast knowledge while organizing this study.

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