A comet-chasing probe is on course for a high-speed encounter this weekend with the largest and least understood asteroid yet visited. At 12:10 p.m. ET on Saturday, the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft is expected to skim within 1,964 miles (3,162 kilometers) of the surface of an asteroid known as 21 Lutetia. Racing past the space rock at about 33,554 miles (54,000 kilometers) an hour, Rosetta will snap a series of pictures and collect data on the asteroid's chemical makeup. (source: news.nationalgeographic.com)
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