Spectroscopic observations by the Very Large Telescope found no trace of water on the asteroid.
Opitom led a team who used MUSE to go in search of any water on Dimorphos. They observed the Didymos–Dimorphos system on 11 occasions, from just before the impact to about a month afterwards. MUSE is able to split the light from the double-asteroid into a spectrum, or rainbow, of colors, to look for emission at specific wavelengths that corresponds to specific molecules.
There was also no evidence in the ejecta of traces of the hydrazine fuel that was on board DART, nor the xenon from its ion engine, although given their small quantities the non-detection is not a surprise. However, MUSE's observations were able to track the evolution of the cloud of ejecta thrown up by the impact, and in particular they helped determine the size distribution of the dust particles initially in the ejecta cloud and later in the tail streaming away from the asteroid.
Views of the Didymos system within the first month of DART's impact as seen by the Ōtehīwai Mt. John Observatory in New Zealand.of dust into space. The VLT–MUSE observations showed fast moving ejecta racing away from the impact site, and then after a few hours the pressure of sunlight pushed on the dust, combined with the gravity of neighboring Didymos, causing the cone-shaped ejecta cloud to twist. Later, over the following weeks, a dust tail grew.
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