Clues about the origin of the solar system could be unlocked soon now that a German-French observation device has landed on an asteroid. That's the hope, and goal, of a Japanese research project. The Japan Space Exploration Agency dropped a Mobile Asteroid Surface Scout, or MASCOT, from it's Hayabusa2 spacecraft onto the asteroid Ryugu on October 3. It took more than three years for the Hayabusa2 to travel 170 million miles (273 million kilometers) and reach the asteroid.