2 min read Volunteers Find Oddly High Solar Flare Rates Patches of the Sun’s surface often show strong magnetic fields. These fields can emerge within a matter of hours, and can decay slowly or quickly, sometimes over days, weeks, or even months. Thanks to a new study about these long-lived active regions, we now know much more about the patches where these strong magnetic fields take at least a month to decay. This study relied on inputs from NASA’s Solar Active Region Spotter citizen science project, which asked volunteers to…
Read MoreExtra Extra! Extra Data Stream Added to the Daily Minor Planet!
2 min read Extra Extra! Extra Data Stream Added to the Daily Minor Planet! The Daily Minor Planet citizen science project is expanding! In addition to data received nightly from the Catalina Sky Survey’s Mt. Lemmon telescope in Arizona, the project’s science team is now processing images from the Bok 2.3-meter telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory. The Bok is a mighty telescope run by the University of Arizona’s Steward Observatory that is used to survey for new near-Earth objects (NEOs) – asteroids that cross Earth’s orbit. Data from the…
Read MoreNASA Selects Finalists in Student Aircraft Maintenance Competition
Image Credit: National Institute of Aerospace NASA has selected eight student teams as finalists in the 2026 Gateways to Blue Skies Competition, giving them the resources to help address a critical challenge for U.S. aviation: maintenance. Challenges facing the commercial aviation industry include a shortage of qualified maintenance workers and increasing demands to keep complicated aircraft running for longer. With Gateways to Blue Skies, NASA taps into student innovation to address some of the biggest topics in aviation, and the current competition, RepAir: Advancing Aircraft Maintenance, is looking for solutions that can have immediate impact. “Through this competition, students will learn about aviation maintenance and be empowered…
Read MoreNASA Armstrong to Host Partnership Days April 15-16
1 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) NASA Graphics NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, invites innovative companies, government agencies, and organizations to attend Partnership Days, scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday, April 15 and 16, at the center. The event offers a unique opportunity to explore collaboration with NASA on cutting-edge research and development in areas such as aerospace, autonomy, sustainability, and more. Attendees will engage with NASA experts and learn how Armstrong’s capabilities can help accelerate innovation and bring transformative technologies to life.…
Read MoreUSBR Crack the Case Challenge
Super Therm has been applied in several places, including handrails on the Hoover Dam Bypass Bridge over the Colorado River. The selection of its makeup of ceramic and polymeric materials was assisted by NASA scientists. Credit: Superior Products InternationaI II, LLC NASA’s Center of Excellence for Collaborative Innovation (CoECI) assists in the use of crowdsourcing across the federal government. CoECI’s NASA Tournament Lab offers the contract capability to run external crowdsourced challenges on behalf of NASA and other agencies. This three-phase challenge invites geophysicists, sensing specialists, nondestructive testing experts, and…
Read MoreNASA Volunteers Study Biofilm Adaptability in Space
2 min read NASA Volunteers Study Biofilm Adaptability in Space Biofilms are communities of microorganisms that stick to one another and also adhere to a nearby surface. They are intricately associated with life on Earth, enabling functions essential to human and plant systems. NASA’s Open Science Data Repository (OSDR) Analysis Working Groups study biofilms and many other biological phenomena in an environment that’s important to NASA: the environment of deep space. It’s not well understood how well biofilms react to the many stresses of spaceflight. Now, a new study, performed…
Read MoreGood Morning, Moon
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Intuitive Machines Early morning sunlight illuminates the western wall of this unnamed crater, leaving deep shadows on the ground and in the interior. The image was taken on August 30, 2023, by LROC (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera). LROC is a system of three cameras and one of the seven instruments aboard NASA’s LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) mission, which launched in June 2009 and continues in orbit around the Moon. LRO’s primary mission was to make a 3D map of the lunar surface to help identify future…
Read MoreAgenda diaria de la misión a la Luna de Artemis II de la NASA
El emblema de la misión Artemis II se observa en el hombro derecho de los trajes sistema de supervivencia de la tripulación de Orion que llevarán los astronautas de la NASA Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover y Christina Koch, así como el astronauta de la CSA (Agencia Espacial Canadiense) Jeremy Hansen, durante el vuelo de prueba de Artemis II. La imagen fue tomada el 17 de enero de 2026 en la sala de equipamiento del Edificio de Operaciones y Preparación Neil A. Armstrong, en el Centro Espacial Kennedy de la NASA, en…
Read MoreNASA’s Artemis II Moon Mission Daily Agenda
The Artemis II mission patch is seen on the right shoulder of the Orion Crew Survival System suits that NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen will wear on the Artemis II test flight are seen, Jan. 17, 2026, in the suit-up room of the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky About eight minutes after Artemis II lifts off, the Orion spacecraft and its crew, NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman,…
Read MoreThis Week’s Sky at a Glance, March 13 – 22
A rare, near perfect young-Moon challenge awaits North Americans after sunset on March 19th. Jupiter rules the evening from on high in central Gemini. The post This Week's Sky at a Glance, March 13 – 22 appeared first on Sky & Telescope.
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