Stardust spacecraft and return capsule

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Collecting a comet sample

Stardust spacecraft and return capsule

Stardust flew through material from comet Wild 2 and returned collected particles to Earth in 2006. The sample made laboratory analysis of cometary material possible.

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At a glance

Collection: Technology
Section: Space exploration
Model: 14,445 triangles · 1.3 MB

Model coverage and boundaries

14 web meshes; 14,445 triangles; 10 embedded image textures. Source chunks/materials are not assumed to be physical components. No exploded view is offered.

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Evidence & model coverage

14 web meshes; 14,445 triangles; 10 embedded image textures. Source chunks/materials are not assumed to be physical components. No exploded view is offered.

Changes: Geometry and materials reserialized; Draco re-encoding may discard degenerate faces. Embedded textures reduced to at most 512 pixels per dimension. Original files retained privately.

Credit: NASA / Brian E. Kumanchik; NASA / Christian A. Lopez. Distributed by NASA. Educational/informational use under NASA media guidelines; no endorsement implied. Geometry and any supplied textures belong to this exact official package. No CC0 assertion.

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Meshes are normalized for viewing. Display size is not a measurement tool. This is an educational exterior/surface visualization; unmodeled interiors and hidden systems are not inferred.

File audit

Retrieved 16 October 2026. Original SHA-256: 1293ce064d66ae0ae288a4278ec2801b22a1a8e4858fe881382c6b1451ab9741. Original and audit evidence retained privately. Full rights entry.