Space missions 1 and ground-based observations 2 have shown that some asteroids are loose collections of rubble rather than solid bodies. The physical behavior of such 'rubble pile' asteroids has been traditionally described using only gravitational and frictional forces within a granular material 3 . Cohesive forces in the form of small van der Waals forces between constituent grains have been recently predicted to be important for small rubble piles (10-kilometer-sized or smaller), and can potentially explain fast rotation rates in the small asteroid population 4-6 . Hitherto, the strongest evidence came from an analysis of the rotational breakup of main belt comet P/2013 R3 (ref. 7), although that was indirect and poorly constrained by present observations. Here we report that the kilometer-sized asteroid (29075) 1950 DA 8 is a rubble pile that is rotating faster than that allowed by gravity and friction. We find that cohesive forces are required to prevent surface mass shedding and structural failure, and that the strength of the forces are comparable to, though somewhat less than, that of lunar regolith.It is possible to infer the existence of cohesive forces within an asteroid by determining if it is a rubble pile with insufficient self-gravity to prevent rotational breakup by centrifugal forces. One of the largest known candidates is near-Earth asteroid 1950 DA (mean diameter of 1.3 km; ref.8), as it has a rotation period of 2.1216 hr that is just beyond the critical spin limit of ~2.2 hr estimated for a cohesionless asteroid 9 . A rubble pile structure and the degree of self-gravity can be determined by a bulk density measurement, which can be acquired through model-tomeasurement comparisons of Yarkovsky orbital drift 10 . This drift arises on a rotating asteroid with non-zero thermal inertia, and is caused by the delayed thermal emission of absorbed sunlight, which applies a small propulsion force to the asteroid's afternoon side. Thermalinfrared observations can constrain the thermal inertia value 11 , and precise astrometric position measurements conducted over several years can constrain the degree of Yarkovsky orbital drift 2 . Recently, the orbital semimajor axis of 1950 DA has been observed to be decreasing at a rate of 44.1 ± 8.5 m yr -1 because of the Yarkovsky effect 12 , which indicates that the asteroid's sense of rotation must be retrograde. Using the Advanced Thermophysical Model 13,14 , in combination with the retrograde radar shape model 8 , archival WISE thermal-infrared data 15 (Extended Data Table 1, and Extended Data Figs 1 and 2), and orbital state 12 , we determine the thermal inertia and bulk density of 1950 DA (Methods). The thermal inertia value is found to be remarkably low at 24 +20 / -14 J m -2 K -1 s -1/2 , which gives a corresponding bulk density of 1.7 ± 0.7 g cm -3 ( Fig. 1 and Extended Data Fig. 3). This bulk density is much lower than the minimum value of 3.5 g cm -3 required to prevent loss of surface material by centrifugal forces (Fig. 2).Spectral observations of 1950...