NASA Delivers Science Instrument to JAXA’s Martian Moons Mission

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3 min read NASA Delivers Science Instrument to JAXA’s Martian Moons Mission On March 14, NASA delivered its gamma-ray and neutron spectrometer instrument to JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) for integration onto JAXA’s MMX (Martian Moons eXploration) mission spacecraft and final system-level testing.   U.S. and Japanese team members gather around and discuss the gamma-ray spectrometer portion of the MEGANE instrument during its development at Johns Hopkins APL. NASA/JAXA/Johns Hopkins APL/Ed Whitman NASA’s Mars-moon Exploration with Gamma Ray and Neutrons (MEGANE) instrument, developed by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL)…

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NASA Announces Semifinalists of Power to Explore Challenge

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NASA selected 45 student essays as semifinalists of its 2024 Power to Explore Challenge, a national competition for K-12 students featuring the enabling power of radioisotopes. Contestants were challenged to explore how NASA has powered some of its most famous science missions and to dream up how their personal “superpower” would energize their success on their own radioisotope-powered science mission. The competition asked students to learn about Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS), “nuclear batteries” that NASA uses to explore the harshest, darkest, and dustiest parts of our solar system. RPS have…

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Women’s History Month: Meet Sarah Mann

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4 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) Sarah Mann NASA Graphics In honor of Women’s History Month, we recently sat down with Sarah Mann, public affairs specialist and member of the Women’s Networking Group (WNG) at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, to learn more about her role and working at NASA. What do you do at NASA and how do you help support Armstrong’s mission? I get to tell the story about the exciting developments that happen with various programs and projects happening…

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Hubble Views a Galaxy Under Pressure

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2 min read Hubble Views a Galaxy Under Pressure This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows dwarf galaxy, LEDA 42160. ESA/Hubble & NASA, M. Sun This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows LEDA 42160, a galaxy about 52 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Virgo. The dwarf galaxy is one of many forcing its way through the comparatively dense gas in the massive Virgo cluster of galaxies. The pressure exerted by this intergalactic gas, known as ram pressure, has dramatic effects on star formation in LEDA 42160. The gas…

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Watch SpaceX’s Starship reenter Earth’s atmosphere in this fiery video

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SpaceX’s third Starship megarocket made sure its epic demise would be remembered. Starship launched today (March 14) for the third time ever, soaring into space from SpaceX‘s Starbase site in South Texas. The giant vehicle notched a number of important milestones, including opening its payload door in space and conducting a propellant-transfer demonstration away from Earth. Starship‘s upper stage didn’t stick its planned water landing in the Indian Ocean, going dark partway through its fiery descent through Earth’s atmosphere. But the ship kept its cameras on during reentry, showing us…

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NASA Artemis Mission Progresses with SpaceX Starship Test Flight

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SpaceX launched the third integrated flight test of its Super Heavy booster and Starship upper stage from the company’s Starbase orbital launch pad at 8:25 a.m. CT on March 14. This flight test is an important milestone toward providing NASA with a Starship HLS for its Artemis missions. SpaceX As part of NASA’s Artemis campaign to return humans to the Moon for the benefit of all, the agency is working with SpaceX to develop the company’s Starship human landing system (HLS), which will land astronauts near the Moon’s South Pole…

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Scientists may have just caught 7 exotic ‘ghost particles’ as they pierced through Earth

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Astronomers using the IceCube observatory, which is buried deep within the ice of the south pole, have detected seven elusive and exotic “ghost particle” candidates as they streamed through Earth. The signals suggest these particles are astrophysical tau neutrinos; they act as important messengers between powerful, high-energy celestial events and us. Neutrinos are charge-less and nearly mass-less particles that blast through the cosmos at speeds approaching that of light. Oddly enough, because of those parameters, neutrinos barely interact with anything. In fact, around 100 trillion of them pass through our bodies…

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La NASA invita a los medios a conocer a astronautas de la estación espacial

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(8 de noviembre de 2021) — La Estación Espacial Internacional, fotografiada desde la nave Crew Dragon Endeavour de SpaceX durante un vuelo alrededor del laboratorio orbital que tuvo lugar tras el desacoplamiento de Dragon del puerto orientado al espacio del módulo Harmony de la estación. Crédito: NASA Read this release in English here. La NASA ofrecerá una rueda de prensa con cuatro astronautas a las 9:30 a.m. EDT (hora del este de EE.UU.) del martes 19 de marzo en la sede de la agencia en Washington. La tripulación, entre la que…

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NASA Invites Media to Meet Space Station Astronauts at Headquarters

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(Nov. 8, 2021) — The International Space Station is pictured from the SpaceX Crew Dragon Endeavour during a fly around of the orbiting lab that took place following its undocking from the Harmony module’s space-facing port. Credits: NASA Lee esta nota de prensa en español aquí. NASA will host a media availability with four astronauts at 9:30 a.m. EDT Tuesday, March 19, at the agency’s headquarters in Washington. The crew, including record-breaking NASA astronaut Frank Rubio, will discuss their recent mission aboard the International Space Station where they conducted a broad…

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