On May 9, 2003, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched Hayabusa, its mission to asteroid 25143 Itokawa. The journey was a demonstration of new technology engineered for returning samples from asteroids: ion engines, autonomous navigation, an asteroid sampler, and a reentry capsule. After a gravity assist from Earth, Hayabusa arrived at Itokawa in September 2005 and began recording data and making observations. Two months later, it became the first spacecraft to make a controlled landing on an asteroid. Despite a series of mechanical mishaps and equipment failures, JAXA’s engineers still managed get Hayabusa’s sample-return capsule safely back to Earth in 2010, making it the first mission to return material from an asteroid.