New Map of All Known Potentially Hazardous Asteroids is Eerily Beautiful

There are some 1,400 Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) currently presenting some degree of threat to human life, according to NASA's record-keeping, the orbits of which the agency has layed out in a new, eerily beautiful graphic.

By definition, a PHA refers to any asteroid at least 460 feet in size with an orbit that passes within 4.7 miles of Earth's. 

However, by continuing to observe and track these objects, the scientists hope to refine their exact orbits and ensure that this is truly the case.

Harder to track are asteroids that are much smaller in size, as seen in the case of Asteroid 2013 LR6, which was discovered a day before it came within roughly 65,000 miles of the planet on June 8.

More worrisome still was the complete surprise by which the Russian meteor took the world earlier this year. Though scientists have since estimated that the fireball measured just 56 feet in diameter, thousands of buildings were damaged and more than 1,000 people were wounded when it detonated over the city of Chelyabinsk on Feb. 15.

Not surprisingly, NASA recently announced plans to shoulder the work of locating threatening asteroids with anyone willing to offer a helping hand.

The call came in the form of a Grand Challenge, a part of the Obama administration's Strategy for American Innovations, and

According to NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver, the challenge is designed to augment rather than replace the agency's work in the field.

"NASA already is working to find asteroids that might be a threat to our planet," she said in a press release at the time, "and while we have found 95 percent of the large asteroids near the Earth's orbit, we need to find all those that might be a threat to Earth."