In this clip, engineers are testing the the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope’s Deployable Aperture Cover. This component is responsible for keeping light out of the telescope barrel. It will be deployed once in orbit using a soft material attached to support booms and remains in this position throughout the observatory’s lifetime. Credit: NASA’s [...]

4 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) A scientific balloon is inflated for the Salter Test Flight before being released during NASA’s 2023 fall balloon campaign. The test flight returns for the 2024 campaign in Fort Sumner, New Mexico, carrying several smaller payloads.NASA/Andrew Hynous NASA’s Scientific Balloon Program has kicked off [...]

2 min read Hubble Spotlights a Supernova This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image reveals the galaxy LEDA 857074. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. J. Foley This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the galaxy LEDA 857074, located in the constellation Eridanus. LEDA 857074 is a barred spiral galaxy, with partially broken spiral arms. The [...]

This final image captured by NASA’s NEOWISE shows part of the Fornax constellation in the Southern Hemisphere. Processed by IPAC at Caltech, this is the mission’s 26,886,704th exposure. It was taken by the spacecraft just before 3 a.m. EDT on Aug. 1, when the mission’s survey ended.Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/IPAC/UCLA Engineers on NASA’s NEOWISE (Near-Earth Object Wide-field [...]

3 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) NASA’s C-20A aircraft completed more than 150 hours of international science flights from May 20 to July 24 in support of an Earth science deployment series. The aircraft, owned and operated by NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, overcame several challenges throughout [...]

4 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) A Terrier Improved Malemute sounding rocket carrying RockSat-X student developed experiments being raised on the launch rail on Wallops IslandNASA NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia is scheduled to launch a sounding rocket carrying student-developed experiments for the RockSat-X mission on Tuesday, Aug. 13. [...]

Interior of the 20-foot diameter vacuum tank at the NASA Lewis Research Center’s Electric Propulsion Laboratory. The Electric Propulsion Laboratory, which began operation in 1961, contained two large vacuum tanks capable of simulating a space environment. The tanks were designed especially for testing ion and plasma thrusters and spacecraft. The larger 25-foot diameter tank [...]

A college team dressed in protective clean room suits prepares their robotic rover to compete in the final round of NASA’s annual Lunabotics competition on Thursday, May 16, 2024. Teams score points when their rover completes challenging tasks inside the Artemis Arena – a simulated lunar landscape inside The Astronauts Memorial Foundation’s Center for Space [...]

“I didn’t always grow up knowing that I was going to be working for NASA. It was just the way my life unfolded, and I couldn’t be more grateful and lucky to have this opportunity to be here. I think hiking is what really got me into my passion for wanting to have this [...]

“The public perception of NASA has a lot to do with our technological successes and the discoveries that we’ve made, but none of that is possible without the people.  “In the six or so years that I’ve worked at NASA, I’ve learned a lot of incredible stories — not just of the struggles that [...]