CAJ - my abstract

Asteroid mining describes the general idea of finding suitable Near Earth Asteroids - NEAs. Suitable in this context means that they are rich in one or more mineral resources, such as water, metals, oxygen or hydrogen. This CAJ focuses on various phases of asteroid mining, from the beginning, when it deals with the question “how to find suitable NEAs” to the actual stage of mining for mineral resources. All of these steps contain some problems and questions that are yet unsolved. There is, for example, the problem of how to attach machines to asteroids since their gravity field is very small. Another aspect scientists think about is where to actually process the mined material. It could be either done directly on the asteroid, on the Earth or maybe somewhere else, such as on the ISS, the international space station. Various sources have been used to write this CAJ. Many different people, who work in this field, have published or contributed to all sorts of mediums, such as books, presentations, videos, academic papers or scientific websites. It is important to mention that the problem of having various sources is that they do sometimes contradict each other. A company that is really interested in asteroid mining and is investing much money is Planetary Ressources. Although they did not yet manage to actually mine for materials on asteroids, they have made progress. However, Planetary Ressources made clear that they do not expect to make profit with their idea overnight, since asteroid mining is something that takes time. Many problems are yet unsolved and need to be fixed in order to make this project happen in the future.