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Here's what you need to know about
Trojan asteroids.

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Over 4 billion years ago

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the newly formed solar system

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consisted of trillions of rocky and icy bodies.

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Many of these objects came together to form the planets.

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Most of the others were scattered to the distant reaches of our solar system

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and beyond.

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But not all of them.

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Some of these primitive bodies now share Jupiter's orbit,

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leading and trailing the planet in two vast swarms

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known as the Trojan asteroids.

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These ancient relics have remained

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gravitationally trapped
for billions of years.

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Astronomers have only studied these
mysterious asteroids from afar.

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But that's all about to change.

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NASA's Lucy mission
will embark on a voyage

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to visit seven
of these primordial objects.

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Named after the Lucy fossil
that transformed our understanding of human evolution,

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the Lucy mission will transform our
understanding of solar system evolution,

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bringing us closer than ever before
to these fossils of planet formation

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while opening new insights
into the origins of Earth

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and ourselves.

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And that's what you need to know
about Trojan asteroids.