Unveiling the Surprising Truth Behind Science's Costliest Material

NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft recently returned a sample from the asteroid Bennu, costing approximately $1.16 billion for just under 9 ounces of material. However, this is not the most expensive material known. Some meteorites can be bought online for as little as $15 per ounce, while Moon rocks from the Apollo program cost $19 million per ounce. The upcoming Mars Sample Return mission is estimated to cost $690 million per ounce. The most expensive materials include synthetic endohedral fullerenes at $141 million per gram and antimatter, which would cost billions of dollars to generate even an ounce.