China launched its first asteroid sample-return mission, Tianwen-2, in the early hours of Thursday, an endeavor to shed light on the formation and evolution of asteroids and the early solar system.

The Tianwen-2 mission aims to achieve multiple goals over a decade-long expedition: collecting samples from the near-Earth asteroid 2016HO3 and exploring the main-belt comet 311P, which is more distant than Mars. A Long March-3B carrier rocket blasted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province at 1:31 a.m. Beijing Time.