New research has unveiled how Earth could be saved if an asteroid ever hurtled towards the planet.

The lifesaving discovery was made after researchers dissected an ancient asteroid as old as the solar system.

Director of the Western Australian Argon Isotope Facility and the School of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Curtin Professor Fred Jourdan old Jo McManus on 6PR the research provides a new, more efficient way to intercept an asteroid.

Press PLAY to hear what Professor Jourdan had to say