One of NASA's goals has been to latch astronauts onto space rocks and take samples for studying, and the agency has just released a rough video-sketch of a plan for how they'd do it. Using the Orion spacecraft, a team could launch from Earth, pick up speed by whipping around the moon, and attach to an asteroid in about nine days. After that, they could dig inside, take a sample, and launch back, once again making a pitstop in the moon's orbit for speed.

The plan is subject to change, and could end up being a lot different from what you see in the video here, but it's cool to think about.