Psyche

Psyche is an orbiter mission that will explore the origin of planetary cores by studying the metallic asteroid 16 Psyche. Lindy Elkins-Tanton of Arizona State University is the Principal Investigator who proposed this mission for NASA's Discovery Program. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) will manage the project. 16 Psyche is the heaviest known M-type asteroid and is thought to be the exposed iron core of a protoplanet, the remnant of a violent collision with another object that stripped off its outer crust. Radar observations of the asteroid from Earth indicate an iron–nickel composition. On 4 January 2017, the Psyche mission was selected for NASA's Discovery #14 mission