Tag: Science & Research

NASA’s Webb Investigates Eternal Sunrises, Sunsets on Distant World

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6 Min Read NASA’s Webb Investigates Eternal Sunrises, Sunsets on Distant World Artists concept of WASP-39 b (full image below). Near-infrared spectral analysis of terminator confirms differences in morning and evening atmosphere Researchers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have finally confirmed what models have previously predicted: An exoplanet has differences between its eternal morning and eternal evening atmosphere. WASP-39 b, a giant planet with a diameter 1.3 times greater than Jupiter, but similar mass to Saturn that orbits a star about 700 light-years away from Earth, is tidally locked…

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Vivid Portrait of Interacting Galaxies Marks Webb’s Second Anniversary

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6 Min Read Vivid Portrait of Interacting Galaxies Marks Webb’s Second Anniversary Webb’s view of the interacting galaxies of Arp 142 that combines Webb’s NIRCam and MIRI instrument images. Full image below. Two for two! A duo of interacting galaxies commemorates the second science anniversary of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, which takes constant observations, including images and highly detailed data known as spectra. Its operations have led to a “parade” of discoveries by astronomers around the world. “Since President Biden and Vice President Harris unveiled the first image from…

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NASA Awards Contract for Infrared Telescope Facility Operations

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Credits: NASA NASA has selected the University of Hawaii in Honolulu to maintain and operate the agency’s Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) on Mauna Kea in Hilo, Hawaii. The Management and Operations of NASA’s IRTF is a hybrid firm-fixed-price contract with an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity provision. The contract has a maximum potential value of approximately $85.5 million, with a base period of performance from Monday, July 1 to June 30, 2025. Nine optional periods, if exercised, would extend the contract through Dec. 31, 2033. Under this contract, the University of Hawaii will provide…

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In Space Production Applications News

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Technological innovations make headlines every day, and NASA’s In Space Production Applications (InSPA) Portfolio of awards are driving these innovations into the future. InSPA awards help U.S. companies demonstrate in-space manufacturing of their products and move them to market, propelling U.S. industry toward the development of a sustainable, scalable, and profitable non-NASA demand for services and products manufactured in the microgravity environment of low Earth orbit for use on Earth. Latest News: A Meta-Analysis of Semiconductor Materials Fabricated in Microgravity (June 26, 2024) ISSRDC Announces “Steps to Space” Session to Educate Future…

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Investigating the Origins of the Crab Nebula With NASA’s Webb

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6 Min Read Investigating the Origins of the Crab Nebula With NASA’s Webb This image by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) and MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) shows different structural details of the Crab Nebula. New data revises our view of this unusual supernova explosion. A team of scientists used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to parse the composition of the Crab Nebula, a supernova remnant located 6,500 light-years away in the constellation Taurus. With the telescope’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) and NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera), the team gathered data that…

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NASA to Discuss Outcome of 5th Biennial Asteroid Threat Exercise

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Representatives from NASA, FEMA, and the planetary defense community participate in the fifth Planetary Defense Interagency Tabletop Exercise on April 2 and 3, 2024, to discuss the nation’s ability to respond effectively to the threat of a potentially hazardous asteroid or comet. Credits: NASA/JHU-APL/Ed Whitman NASA will host a virtual media briefing at 3:30 p.m. EDT, Thursday, June 20, to discuss a new summary of a recent tabletop exercise to simulate national and international responses to a hypothetical asteroid impact threat. The fifth biennial Planetary Defense Interagency Tabletop Exercise was…

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NASA’s Roman Mission Gets Cosmic ‘Sneak Peek’ From Supercomputers

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Researchers are diving into a synthetic universe to help us better understand the real one. Using supercomputers at the U.S. DOE’s (Department of Energy’s) Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois, scientists have created nearly 4 million simulated images depicting the cosmos as NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, jointly funded by NSF (the National Science Foundation) and DOE, in Chile will see it. Michael Troxel, an associate professor of physics at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, led the simulation campaign as part of a…

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NASA Awards Advance Technologies for Future Habitable Worlds Mission

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This artist’s concept features one of multiple initial possible design options for NASA’s Habitable Worlds Observatory. Credits: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab NASA announced Friday it selected three industry proposals to help develop technologies for future large space telescopes and plan for the agency’s Habitable Worlds Observatory mission concept, which could be the first space telescope designed to search for life outside our solar system. The mission would directly image Earth-like planets around stars like our Sun and study their atmospheres for the chemical signatures of life,…

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Space Station Research Advances NASA’s Plans to Explore the Moon, Mars

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4 Min Read Space Station Research Advances NASA’s Plans to Explore the Moon, Mars The full moon is pictured as the International Space Station orbited 254 miles above the Pacific Ocean northeast of Guam. Credits: NASA Space, the saying goes, is hard. And the farther humans go, the harder it can get. Some of the challenges on missions to explore the Moon and Mars include preventing microbial contamination of these destinations, navigating there safely, protecting crew members and hardware from radiation, and maintaining and repairing equipment. Research on the International…

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NASA’s Heliophysics Experiment to Study Sun on European Mission

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The Joint EUV coronal Diagnostic Investigation (JEDI) will fly aboard the European Space Agency’s Vigil space weather mission and capture new views that will help researchers connect features on the Sun’s surface to those in the Sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona. Credits: NASA NASA announced Tuesday it selected a new instrument to study the Sun and how it creates massive solar eruptions. The agency’s Joint EUV coronal Diagnostic Investigation, or JEDI, will capture images of the Sun in extreme ultraviolet light, a type of light invisible to our eyes but…

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