NASA

NASA’s Jason Hopper is shown at the E Test Complex at NASA’s Stennis Space Center.NASA/Danny Nowlin Jason Hopper’s journey to NASA started with assessing the risk of stepping into the unknown. One day, while taking a break from his hobby of rock climbing at Mississippi State University, a fellow student noticed Hopper reading a rocket propulsion textbook with a photo of a space shuttle launch on the cover. Rocket propulsion – the technology that propels vehicles into space, usually through liquid rocket engines or solid rocket motors – is a highly complex field. Engineers rigorously test the propulsion systems and components to understand their capabilities and limitations, ensuring rockets can safely reach space. “A guy just walked up and randomly said, ‘Hey, my dad works testing rocket engines,’” Hopper recalled. Hopper, an aerospace engineering student at the time, did not know about NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. He soon would learn more. The fellow student provided him with contact information, and the rest is history. A Meridian, Mississippi, native, Hopper graduated from Mississippi State in 2007 and made his way to America’s largest rocket propulsion test site in south Mississippi. On the other side of Hopper’s risk of stepping into the unknown came the reward of realizing how far he had come from reading about rocket propulsion work to contributing to it. The career highlight happened when Hopper watched a space shuttle launch, powered in part by an engine he had fired up as a test conductor working at NASA Stennis. “You cannot really put it into words because it permeates all through you, knowing that you are a part of something that big while at the same time, you are just a little piece of it,” he said. Hopper transitioned from his contractor position to a civil servant role as test conductor when he joined NASA in 2011. His work as a test conductor throughout all the NASA Stennis test areas and as test director at the E Test Complex has benefited NASA and industry, while giving him a good perspective on the value of the center’s work. Among the projects he has played a large role in include the J-2X engine test program, build up for NASA’s SLS (Space Launch System) core stage hot fire ahead of the successful Artemis I launch and multiple projects throughout the E Test Complex. “We offer operational excellence that I would argue you cannot get anywhere else,” Hopper said. “NASA Stennis is a smaller, family-oriented center renowned for excellence in rocket propulsion testing. It is a small place, where we do amazing things.” Propulsion test customers at NASA Stennis include government and commercial projects. The NASA center is engaged in two projects to support the agency’s SLS rocket – testing of RS-25 engines to help power SLS launches and of NASA’s new exploration upper stage to fly on future missions to the Moon. Current commercial companies conducting work at NASA Stennis include Blue Origin; Boeing; Evolution Space; Launcher, a Vast company; Relativity Space; and Rolls-Royce. Three companies – Relativity Space, Rocket Lab, and Evolution Space – are establishing production and/or test operations onsite. After leaving south Mississippi for a four-year stint at NASA’s Marshall Spaceflight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, Hopper returned to NASA Stennis as risk manager of NASA’s Rocket Propulsion Test Program Office. In his day-to-day work, Hopper assesses risk around two questions – what is the risk and what do I really need to be focusing on? Making decisions through this filter helps the Poplarville, Mississippi, resident make the best use of the agency’s rocket propulsion test assets, activities, and resources. “With a risk perspective, if things are high risk, we need to address these items and focus our attention on them,” Hopper said. “If we lose a national test capability, that impacts more than just NASA; it impacts the nation because NASA is a significant enabler of commercial spaceflight.” Hopper helps oversee the maintenance and sustainment of propulsion test capabilities across four sites – NASA Stennis; NASA Marshall; NASA’s Neil Armstrong Test Facility in Sandusky, Ohio; and NASA’s White Sands Test Facility in Las Cruces, New Mexico. By establishing and maintaining world-class test facilities, the agency’s Rocket Propulsion Test Program Office ensures that NASA and its partners can conduct safe, efficient, and cost-effective rocket propulsion tests to support the advancement of space exploration and technology development. Hopper looks to the future with optimism. “We have an opportunity to redefine kind of what we as NASA and NASA Stennis do and how we do it,” he said. “Before, we were trying to help commercial companies figure things out. We were trying to get them up and going, but now we are in more of a support role in a lot of ways and so if you look at it, and approach it the right way, it can be very exciting.” View the full article

The National Society of Professional Engineers recently named Debbie Korth, Orion deputy program manager at Johnson Space Center, as NASA’s 2025 Engineer of the Year. Korth was recognized during an award ceremony at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 21, alongside honorees from 17 other federal agencies. The annual awards program honors the impactful contributions of federal engineers and their commitment to public service. Debbie Korth received the NASA 2025 Engineer of the Year Award from the National Society of Professional Engineers at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Image courtesy of Debbie Korth Korth said she was shocked to receive the award. “At NASA there are so many brilliant, talented engineers who I get to work with every day who are so specialized and know so much about a certain area,” she said. “It was very surprising, but very appreciated.” Korth has dedicated more than 30 years of her career to NASA, supporting human spaceflight development, integration, and operations across the Space Shuttle, International Space Station, and Orion Programs. Her earliest roles involved extravehicular and mission operations planning, as well as managing spaceflight hardware for shuttle missions and space station crews. Working on hardware such as the Crew Health Care System in the early days of space station planning and development was a unique experience for Korth. After spending significant time in Russia collaborating with Russian counterparts to integrate equipment such as a treadmill, cycle ergometer, and blood pressure monitor into their module, Korth recalled, “When we finally got that all delivered and integrated, it was a huge step because we had to have all of that on board before we could put crew members on the station for the first time. I remember feeling a huge sense of accomplishment and happiness that we were able to work through this international partnership and forge those relationships to get that hardware integrated.” Korth transitioned to the Orion Program in 2008 and has since served in a variety of leadership roles. In her current role, Korth assists the program manager in the design, development, testing, verification, and certification of Orion, NASA’s next-generation, human-rated spacecraft for Artemis missions. The spacecraft’s first flight test around the Moon during the Artemis I mission was a standout experience for Korth and a major accomplishment for the Orion team. “It was a long mission and every day we were learning more and more about the spacecraft and pushing boundaries,” she said. “We really wrung out some of the core systems – systems that were developed individually and for the first time we got to see them work together.” Korth said that understanding how different systems interact with each other is what she loves most about engineering. “In systems engineering, you really look at how changes to and the performance of one system affects everything else,” she said. “I like looking across the entire spacecraft and saying, if I have to strengthen this structure to take some additional landing loads, that’s going to add mass to the vehicle, which means I have to look at my parachutes and the thermal protection system to make sure they can handle that increased load.” The Orion team is working to achieve two major milestones in 2025 – delivery of the Artemis II Orion spacecraft to the Exploration Ground Systems team that will fuel and integrate Orion with its launch abort system at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, and the spacecraft’s integration with the Space Launch System rocket, which is currently being stacked. These milestones will support the launch of the first crewed mission on NASA’s path to establishing a long-term presence at the Moon for science and exploration, with liftoff targeted no earlier than April 2026. “It’s going to be a big year,” said Korth. View the full article

Curiosity Navigation Curiosity Home Mission Overview Where is Curiosity? Mission Updates Science Overview Instruments Highlights Exploration Goals News and Features Multimedia Curiosity Raw Images Images Videos Audio Mosaics More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions Mars Home 2 min read Sols 4468-4470: A Wintry Mix of Mars Science NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity captured this image showing its wheel awkwardly perched atop one of the rocks in this location, as well as the textures of the layered sulfate unit bedrock blocks. The rover used its Left Navigation Camera (Navcam), one of a pair of stereo cameras on either side of the rover’s masthead, to record the image on Feb. 28, 2025, on sol 4466, or Martian day 4,466 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission, at 00:34:10 UTC. NASA/JPL-Caltech Written by Lucy Lim, Planetary Scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Earth planning date: Friday, Feb. 28, 2025 Curiosity continues to climb roughly southward through the layered sulfate strata toward the “boxwork” features. Although the previous plan’s drive successfully advanced the rover roughly 21 meters southward (about 69 feet), the drive had ended with an awkwardly perched wheel. Because of this, unfortunately it was considered too risky to unstow the arm for contact science in this plan. Nevertheless the team made the most of the imaging and LIBS observations available from the rover’s current location. A large Mastcam mosaic was planned on the nearby Texoli butte to capture its sedimentary structures from the rover’s new perspective. Toward the west, the boxwork strata exposed on “Gould Mesa” were observed using the ChemCam long-distance imaging capability, with Mastcam providing color context. Several near-field Mastcam mosaics also captured some bedding and diagenetic structure in the nearby blocks as well as some modern aeolian troughs in the finer-grained material around them. On the nearby blocks, two representative local blocks (“Gabrelino Trail” and “Sespe Creek”) are to be “zapped” with the ChemCam laser to give us LIBS (laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy) compositional measurements. The original Gabrelino Trail on Earth near the JPL campus is currently closed due to damage from the recent wildfires. Meanwhile, the season on Mars (L_s ~ 50, or a solar longitude of about 50 degrees, heading into southern winter) has brought with it the opportunity to observe some recurring atmospheric phenomena: It’s aphelion cloud belt season, as well as Hadley cell transition season, during which a more southerly air mass crosses over Gale Crater. This plan includes an APXS atmospheric observation (no arm movement required!) to measure argon and a ChemCam passive-sky observation to measure O2, which is a small (less than 1%) but measurable component in the Martian atmosphere. Dedicated cloud altitude observations, a phase function sky survey, and zenith and suprahorizon movies have also been included in the plan to characterize the clouds. As usual, the rover also continues to monitor the modern environment with measurements of atmospheric opacity via imaging, temperature, and humidity with REMS, and the local neutron environment with DAN. Share Details Last Updated Mar 04, 2025 Related Terms Blogs Explore More 2 min read Smooshing for Science: A Flat-Out Success Article 3 days ago 4 min read Sols 4466-4468: Heading Into the Small Canyon Article 5 days ago 2 min read Sols 4464-4465: Making Good Progress Article 5 days ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun, and the seventh largest. It’s the only planet we know of inhabited… All Mars Resources Explore this collection of Mars images, videos, resources, PDFs, and toolkits. Discover valuable content designed to inform, educate, and inspire,… Rover Basics Each robotic explorer sent to the Red Planet has its own unique capabilities driven by science. Many attributes of a… Mars Exploration: Science Goals The key to understanding the past, present or future potential for life on Mars can be found in NASA’s four… View the full article

I’m really pleased that you agreed to take advantage of this opportunity. I don’t recall if I have actually met you personally, but if so, then I apologize for not remembering. I don’t think so, although you’ve certainly signed things for me. Well, I guess I have because I do remember seeing your name from time to time on various things. You’ve been at Ames a long time and we’ll have you talk about that in a little bit. The focus of these interviews is not specifically on your work. In fact, it was intended to broaden people’s understanding of who you are and what you do when you’re not at work, because we get compartmentalized and mostly get to know people through our work interactions, so we’ll be touching on your other interests. As you’ve seen if you’ve read some of these, we generally start with your childhood. I try to look up bios and things like that ahead of time to see what I can glean before these interviews but you don’t have a very substantial presence on the web. I’m not a very public person. I did find that out (laughs). I did not volunteer for these and I tried to lay low until you hunted me down! (laughs) Well, I think you’ll be pleased and as I said, you can stay as private as you want during this whole interview. Sounds good. We like to start with where you were born, your family at the time, what your parents did, if you have siblings, and then we ask when became aware of or developed an interest in what you have pursued as a career. OK, and I’m going to be looking sideways at my notes because I printed out your list of questions and thought about them. Hopefully I won’t mess it up too much. I’m a big believer in the written word. I was born in Oakland, just up the Bay. So was I, so we have a connection right there! Up through my preteen years I grew up split between Oakland and North Lake Tahoe. My dad was a masonry contractor. When school got out in June we would go up to Tahoe where there was lots of work for him, building foundations for homes and so forth. When Christmas break came in school, we came back down to Oakland. We had a home in both places and dad could get work in the winter in the Bay Area. In the middle of every year during my preteen years, I switched between two schools. It was usually a bit of a jolt because the Oakland schools were ahead of the Tahoe schools, so there were a couple weeks of flailing about in January trying to catch up. They all used the same textbooks, but we were a couple of chapters behind at that point and had to catch up. When I was 12, Dad had established his business well enough at Tahoe that my parents sold both of the houses, built a somewhat bigger one, and we moved to Tahoe permanently. So from seventh grade through high school it was all at the northern end of Lake Tahoe. I have one sibling, a brother. And when did I start thinking about becoming an astronomer? I can’t remember exactly, to be perfectly honest. I do remember my parents showing me the constellations. I can remember specifically which constellations my dad showed me and which ones my mom showed me. I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t interested primarily in being an astronomer, but I probably went through an astronaut phase because it was the ‘60’s! I got an astronomy book for my birthday one year and I know it was before I could really read and understand it. I remember looking at the pictures. In thinking about this interview, I went back and looked. That book was published when I was five, so probably by the time I was five I was talking about it enough that I got this book for my birthday. I don’t have any similar books on other topics from that time. All the other books I have from back then are astronomy books for kids. Well, you were living in Lake Tahoe, which by the elevation and the clarity and lack of ambient lights around you would have had a really good view of the stars and constellations. Right. It was great. Although before we moved up there full time we were mostly there in the summer, so it didn’t get dark until after my bedtime. When we moved up there full time, then I could go out in the winter and yeah, we had a spectacular view of the southern sky. There were woods but we could see over the trees. We could see the center of the Milky Way, and so forth. I had binoculars and a couple of small telescopes that I’d use, along with a star atlas to point me toward interesting things to look at. Did you say what your mother did? Did she work outside the home? Mom was a writer. We traveled each year when we were growing up. She would write travelogues of those trips and try to get them published. She also wrote haiku poetry, and she tried her hand at writing other things. She was published a bit, but not a whole lot. Mom did get one of her travelogues published in the Christian Science Monitor. That was a highlight for her. And was your brother older or younger? My brother is two years younger, and we had somewhat similar trajectories. We’ll get to education later but he majored in physics as well. He followed me in similar universities, but ended up going into material sciences. He is now on the East Coast working for IBM. That’s great. He was named a Master Inventor in 2018. A what? A Master Inventor. He has over 200 patents, so IBM honored him with this title. That’s quite an honor! Your education was interesting because of the split between the two schools. But then at some point, when you went to college, you had to declare a major. You said you had already developed an interest in astronomy, so did you pursue that science discipline right off the bat? I went to UC Riverside for two years, and then I transferred to Caltech. My freshman year I really nailed down my choice for astronomy. I remember going to the Career Center and taking an interest survey, which has nothing to do with what you’re able to do. It just asks what you’re interested in doing, and it came up as physicist or musician. I have no musical skills so that pointed me in the other direction. I thought briefly about geology, since my dad had been a geology major, but I really settled on astronomy at that point, which is why I transferred. Riverside didn’t have an astronomy major, they only had a physics major. I really wanted to get an astronomy background and start on it early. My time at Caltech was probably the toughest two years I’ve ever had. I was behind because I had gone to Riverside for two years and the Caltech student body was extremely competitive. Caltech was not generous with their transfer credits. I ended up taking a very heavy course load, but I did make it out in two years. From there I applied to a number of grad schools. I settled on Cornell for a couple reasons: First of all because they had groups working in the areas of astronomy I thought I was interested in, which were radio and infrared. Second of all, after four years in southern California I really wanted to go to a more rural setting to continue my education. I have to ask this because when we’ve interviewed others who have gone to Cornell, most of them have mentioned the influence of Carl Sagan and I just wondered if that figured into your choice, or was he gone by the time you went there? Well, I did meet Carl, at a second year reception he threw for the grad students. He was gone most of my first year working on Cosmos the television show. He had taken a leave of absence and wasn’t around. When he came back he threw a reception for all of us, and I got to shake his hand. He was a planetary scientist, of course, and that was not where I was aiming my trajectory. I didn’t see him a whole lot other than that one reception. Although from time to time the kind of people you really don’t want wandering around the halls would come around the building looking for Carl Sagan. Security would chase them down and get them out. These are really my most distinct memories of Carl. And your PhD was in astronomy, not physics? It was in astronomy and my dissertation was on radio astronomy. I did it almost exclusively at Arecibo (Arecibo Observatory, National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center, Arecibo, Puerto Rico) with a little bit at the VLA (Very Large Array Radio Telescope facility, near Socorro, New Mexico). I got to work with some really smart people at Cornell, observational and theoretical. At this point we usually inquire about the connection or the influence, that brought you from your PhD to NASA Ames. My degree was in radio astronomy but the other interest I always had along the way, which I hadn’t been able to look into, was infrared astronomy. Getting post docs is very competitive, back then we called them NRC’s. The NRC offer from Ed Erickson’s group at Ames was the best offer, so I came out for that. It wasn’t a sure thing, there was back and forth and the highest rated candidate had to turn down the job before they would make me an offer. But fortunately for me the highest rated candidate was my office mate at Cornell. I knew he was going to turn down the offer as soon as he got another one he wanted, so I was aware a little bit in advance of getting the call from Ed that things had worked out. And Ed was your advisor? Ed was my advisor. So I came and did two years as an NRC and then continued working with the group. I had made myself sufficiently useful that when I was ready to apply for other jobs, Ed offered me a raise if I’d stay with the group and continue working. That was a really good time. We flew on the KAO (Kuiper Airborne Observatory). They didn’t really have facility instruments, so we had our own instrument, but we did support observers from outside our group. We probably had more flights than any other instrument on the KAO during that period. It was a lot of flights. We had to operate it ourselves. All of us had our own particular jobs on flights. We did everything from prepping for the observations, writing proposals, all the way through to seeing them published. We were a small team: Ed Erickson, Mike Haas; Jan Simpson, and Bob Rubin on the science side helped out. We had a shop guy, Gene Beckstrom, and others after him. We had a lab technician, Jim Baltz. Dave Hollenbach would also work with us, and that was very rewarding. He was a very sharp guy in terms of theory, ideas and projects to do. Here is a photo of some of us with our instrument rack getting ready for a KAO flight: Sean Colgan with his team on the KAO (Kuiper Airborne Observatory). So you came in on an NRC postdoctoral fellowship in the mid-‘80’s? Yes, I started on October 6th, 1986. And your first work was on the KAO and then probably a decade later you continued on SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy)? It was ‘95 or ‘96 when they shut down the KAO to use the funding for SOFIA development. I remember the meeting still. It was in the upstairs auditorium and they came in and announced they were shutting the KAO down. I think it was Dave Morrison, who was the division chief, who told us not to whine about shutting it down because planetary missions sometimes had years when they didn’t have their facilities. In this case it was only going to be two years and we would be up and flying in 1997. Of course, as we know, it was more like ten years after that before we were even close to flying. Yes, I thought the same thing, that it was not going to be two years. It always takes longer than that. Well, I don’t think anybody thought it was going to be as many years as it was. But you flew on both the KAO and SOFIA? I had ninety nine flights on the Kuiper (KAO) because I kept track of them, and on SOFIA I had two flights, so I was not a flyer on SOFIA. It was more of a facility observatory, and the people who flew a lot were really part of the observatory. They were operating the telescope or operating a science instrument. My flights on SOFIA were because I had written some software for the GREAT Instrument (German Receiver for Astronomy at Terahertz Frequencies, a modular dual-color heterodyne instrument for high-resolution far-infrared spectroscopy) to help them interface with SOFIA. I was along on those commissioning flights for GREAT in case my software broke. They wanted me on board. Interestingly by the rules at the time, I wouldn’t be allowed to actually fix the software in flight because it was flight software and had to go through all the reviews. None of the people who could do the reviews were on the airplane, but I could see how it broke and maybe I could suggest workarounds. It was not nearly as much fun for me as the KAO. I didn’t really have a job. The software had issues from time to time, but it basically worked. Everybody else had jobs, so for me it was less interesting, which is why I didn’t make a huge effort to keep flying on SOFIA. Did you stay on the SOFIA project as a somewhat non flying support person? Yes, from when the Kuiper stopped flying until about, well now, my primary work on SOFIA has been first with the project science team during development – trying to make sure they met our requirements, helping everybody understand our requirements, trying to make sure they weren’t making any huge mistakes. They made them anyway, especially when they didn’t listen to us, but we did our best. During the early years of SOFIA, I was also on the Ames team developing AIRES – a facility Science Instrument for SOFIA. I led the software effort, but the development was canceled in 2001. I then got involved with the software that people would use to propose to SOFIA, the proposal software, the software to estimate how long you should be asking for time, the sensitivity of the instruments, pieces of software like that. I worked with Dave Goorvich. We got software from other observatories as starting points and then modified them for SOFIA, software “re-use” they called it. And that was basically my main job throughout SOFIA’s lifetime. Once we developed those, the USRA (Universities Space Research Association) folks built their team around maintaining them and I joined that team because I’d been working on this software for so long. I also got into the package I mentioned to help GREAT interface to SOFIA. It basically made SOFIA look like the telescope that the GREAT team had been using for years, an observatory called KOSMA. We called it the translator and it translated KOSMA commands into SOFIA commands; then SOFIA housekeeping back into KOSMA housekeeping, so they didn’t need to change their software to work with SOFIA. As the aircraft started flying, it became quite clear that I was oversubscribed. I was not meeting my deadlines for either of those two efforts, so I gave up the translator. They hired another fellow to maintain that, although I stayed in touch with it for some years, helping him when he had questions and so forth. I then focused my main effort over on SOFIA’s DCS (Data Cycle System) side. What has been your most interesting work here at Ames? I’d say it was flying on the KAO, but very specifically it was Supernova 1987A which occurred after I had been here for only a couple of months. It went off in February of 1987. Nobody really knew what it would look like in the infrared to an instrument on an observatory like the KAO, so it was obviously a huge deal since it was the closest supernova for hundreds of years. Our team just completely redirected to carry out observations of the supernova. Dave Hollenbach and I worked together to try and figure out what we would see. We wrote up the science portion of the proposal,. For these observations, our instrument – the CGS (Cooled-Grating-Spectrometer) – had to be fairly substantially reworked in the sense that the grating needed to be changed to go to lower resolution and the detectors needed to be changed to get wider bandwidth and go to shorter wavelengths. Ed and Mike worked long days, weeks, and months to make all of those changes happen. In our proposal we made some predictions about which lines we could see, mostly iron lines, and which ionization states. We put that in the proposal, which was accepted. We then wrote up the proposal as a separate paper. When we went down and did the observations, we actually got some of it right. Surprisingly, iron was indeed bright. We thought we’d be seeing all different ionized states of iron, from singly, doubly, triply ionized iron, when in fact it was very much concentrated in singly ionized iron with a little bit of doubly ionized iron, there was a faint line there. We had gotten the temperatures right, but we didn’t quite get the ionization right. We were in the ballpark, so I think this was really the most interesting work in that when we started nobody had really seen anything like it before. We were starting from very basic principles, and we followed that all the way through to a nice series of papers. We went down for three different epochs because the lines were changing with time as the supernova ejecta expanded. We obtained three sets of measurements, which resulted in three papers. What I’m currently working on? Well, SOFIA is, of course, shut down and I am working as part of the shutdown process. We’re trying to reprocess a lot of the data to bring it up to standard, especially the older data. We learned more about the instruments as time went on, so we can now do a better job of reducing the data. I’m helping out with reducing the data, getting it into the archive as we shut down, and of course, writing proposals. What comes next? So far I’ve collaborated mainly with Naseem, whom you have spoken to, Sarah Nickerson, whom you also have spoken to, and Doug Hoffman (whom we’ve also spoken to). So that’s proposals. How is your work relevant to Ames and the NASA mission? Well, I’ve worked on NASA missions almost my entire career, so I think that’s the closest to relevance as you can get. What is a typical day like for you? I mostly work, well before the pandemic in my office, but now it’s back and forth. I do like to come into the office although this week is a little different. That’s why we’re doing this interview from home. My wife is out of town and I like to work at home on those weeks just to keep the dog out of trouble. So I’m at a computer. I’m a software guy and a data analysis guy, not a lab guy, so I work at the computer. I actually have several computers on my desk. I look like a real developer (laughs). If you see my desk, I’ve got a couple of big screens and couple of computers underneath hooked up to different things and I can switch them around. So that’s a typical day, but at home it’s a little tougher. I don’t have a desk that can really manage the big screens, so I’ve just got one little laptop screen to work with. Is home close enough that the pandemic shut down of the Center didn’t really save you a whole lot of commute time? I live across the Bay in Newark, which physically is not far, but traffic wise is not good. I typically come in later and stay later because that works with my wife’s schedule and also works with the traffic. We’re not so close that it’s easy. I hated during the pandemic having to work at home all the time because of the small screen and with no room to spread out piles of paper or stay organized. That was definitely a challenge. I was very glad to get back on site. What do you like most and least about your job? Most would be doing science, but I also enjoy coding. Least is probably the standard sorts of things that most people whine about when given any opportunity. All the stuff that goes with the job that isn’t science or coding, like IT security and paperwork. Right now I’m in the midst of training, taking courses I’ve taken every year for the last ten years, which gets a little old after a while, things like that. But somebody thinks you need to do it, and I hope it makes us a better organization for everybody doing it. Do you have a favorite memory from your career? Or perhaps a research finding or breakthrough, or an unexpected research result? My favorite memory would be the Supernova 1987A work in general. We found some unexpected things there and we got some things right. If you could have a dream job, what would it be? My dream job is pretty close to what I have. Pretty close without all the extra stuff. What advice would you give to someone who wants a career like yours? Of course you’ve got to work hard, and you need to have an aptitude for it. It’s a very competitive field, so you’ve also got to realize that luck, or being in the right place at the right time, can be a factor in whether you continue or not. I’ve had colleagues who were very good at what they do, but they just weren’t in the right place at the right time. They ended up leaving the field or doing something less than what they hoped. Some things are just out of your control. I did get lucky. I was in the right place at the right time. I flew on the Kuiper, and I developed skills. When SOFIA started, those skills were very much in demand. That was my right place, right time moment, which is when I joined the civil service. I had been a contractor after my NRC ended through 1997. I became a civil servant then because there was so much work on SOFIA. I don’t know if that’s helpful advice, but it’s just my take on things. Well, you’re right. There’s something to being in the right place, at the right time and being prepared, but there’s always the serendipity aspect, which is just part of life. You could have wound up somewhere else and been just as happy, you know. Oh yes, It doesn’t necessarily relate to happiness, but you’ve got to make the best with what you have. I do feel lucky about that. Would you like to share anything about your family? Kids, pets, activities? You mentioned a dog? I’m going to mix the order up a little bit. Sure, go ahead. The accomplishment I’m most proud of that’s not science related would be 40 years of marriage to my fabulous wife. We just celebrated our 40th anniversary about a week and a half ago. Congratulations! That is indeed an accomplishment. So, no children but we do have a dog, a little Welsh Corgi. She’s our second corgi and she is just great. We do enjoy traveling. Typically, we’ll go on vacation in August. often to Europe. We’ve visited the UK five or six times, France a couple of times, Italy a couple of times. My father-in-law was born in Hungary, so we’ve gone there a couple times. Here is a photo of us at Lake Louise in 2019, with our Corgi. Sean Colgan with his wife and Corgi at Lake Louise in 2019 What do we do for fun the rest of the time? Besides leisure travel, I enjoy gardening. We also enjoy musical events. We have season tickets to the San Jose Opera, for example, and we’ll go up to San Francisco for concerts a couple of times a year. We probably have an event every other month. During the pandemic, the restaurants and movie theaters were closed, but wineries with outdoor spaces were open. They started serving food during the pandemic, and they allowed dogs, so we got in the habit of doing a lot of wine tasting on weekends just to get out. We still do some of that. To celebrate our 40th, we went up to Napa and tasted a lot of great wines. (laughs) You mentioned that you’re not particularly musical, so you don’t play an instrument or anything, but you enjoy music and opera. I enjoy listening to music. I played instruments as a child but had no particular talent for it, so. . . . Do you like to read? And if so, any particular genre? I read a fair bit, and it’s sort of divided. For entertainment, I’ll read fantasy and science fiction, but when we go on our trips, I’m always buying books about what we’re doing. For example, if we go to France and visit cathedrals, I’ll buy books about how they built cathedrals; or in England I’ll read about old Stone Age tombs. Everybody’s heard about Stonehenge, but there are stone circles and other stacks of stones, big ones, all over the landscape, so I will buy books and read about them. I have books about Roman battle tactics, etc. Oh yes, and I also have a lot of geology books, depending on where we go. When we went to the Canadian Rockies, I got a lot of geology books about that locale. I bring those home, stack them up, and read them, hopefully before the next trip. So yes, a lot of reading. When my wife travels, sometimes I’ll go hiking. She’s gone up to 15-20 weekends a year She’s a textile artist.She teaches lacemaking, which is the way they used to make lace by hand, before machines. There are groups around the country that enjoy lacemaking, so she travels to teach workshops for them on weekends. Wow, that’s fascinating! This week, she’s actually up in Sparks, next to Reno, where the National Convention is going on. It moves around every year, but this year it’s relatively close. She travels a lot for that, which keeps her busy. When she’s away, our dog and I will sometimes go for hikes, if we don’t have too much other stuff to do. Interestingly, we are not the only astronomer-lacemaker couple in the world (laughs). There’s an Australian couple – Ron and Jay Ekers – with Jay a lacemaker and Ron an astronomer. We had dinner with them once when they were visiting in the Bay Area because our wives knew each other. My wife had once traveled down to teach in Australia. Normally she just travels around the U.S., but she has done some international trips. Now, is this manual lacemaking with needles and thread or . . . ? There can be needles and thread. That’s one form of it. What my wife teaches is “bobbin lace”, which is made on a pillow usually stuffed with straw. Two bobbins are connected by a thread with many of these pairs used to weave threads together to create the pattern. Photos of Louise’s designs are on her website – https://colganlacestudio.com/. Here’s a photo of what a lace pillow looks like. “Bobbin lace”, which is made on a pillow usually stuffed with straw. Two bobbins are connected by a thread with many of these pairs used to weave threads together to create the pattern Interesting. And when did she get interested in this? Was it something she learned as a child, from her mother or grandmother? No, it was at Cornell. She was in grad school there, which is where we met. And what was her course of study? She was in a Master’s program for historic preservation, basically how to preserve old buildings, of which there are many in upstate New York and few in the Bay Area. She had finished her class work, and I still had several years to go on my dissertation. She looked around for something to fill her time, and one of her friends – a colleague in her department – had already taken this up, and brought her to a meeting. She started taking classes from a local teacher, and by the time we moved west, she was well-versed. Not many people out here knew how to do it, so she started taking on students. So I’m calculating back, since I’m a numbers guy, that if you just celebrated your 40th anniversary, then you must have married her while you were still in grad school? Yes, about halfway through grad school, in 1983. Interesting. So you’re a little bit responsible for her developing this interest in lacemaking? I wouldn’t claim any of that. But you’re responsible for giving her the time to develop this interest in lacemaking that she has done so well in. It was all her effort. If anything, I made conditions difficult for her, and she found her way out (laughs). That’s probably the way I would phrase it. Fair enough. But it’s very interesting. I like when we can poke around a little bit and find out interesting things, because then people who read this will say, “Well, I didn’t know that he went there or that his wife does lacemaking or the other things that you’ve talked about. That’s part of the purpose of these interviews. Who or what inspires you? That was a real easy one for me: the night sky. It’s not so great in the Bay Area most times, but there’s so much going on up there. I mean, it’s really all laid out for you. Since I studied and read about a lot about the sky as a kid, I know my way around it. a I also know fun little facts, so that’s entertaining to recall as well. When you get up in the mountains, of course it’s just beautiful. I feel the same way. I don’t see how anyone can look up at and ponder the night sky and not be just fascinated by it. The questions that come up about what it is, how it came to be, what its purpose is, if there is one, and all of that is just fascinating. Yes, I agree. Do you have a favorite image, of space or anything that is particularly meaningful to you? You know I don’t have one now. I mean, there are a lot of very nice ones out there. A big favorite I remember as a kid was a photo of H and Chi Persei, which is a double cluster of stars, not globular clusters but open clusters. It’s very colorful, with red stars and white stars and blue stars in the image – and just imagining it so far away, but these particular stars are so close together. I don’t know much about it, but something about it just impressed me. A photo like what I remember is at https://www.astrobin.com/337742/. The reason we ask about images is because we like to include them in the post, especially about things you’ve talked about. You mentioned for example, the Supernova 1987A. If a picture from SOFIA came out of that it would be a great addition to this interview. And then maybe you have a picture of you and the corgi on a hike, or your wife doing lace work, anything like that would be great. Well, we’ll work on that. [Photo thoughts: The three of us from Lake Louise, link to H & Chi Persei photo on the web, Lace Pillow showing bobbins] That would be for when you return it after editing. By the way the transcript is a living document so you can make changes right on it and that’s how it will go in. It isn’t all that formal, we’re not tracking edits or anything like that. We’ll add your pictures and get to a point where it’s set up as it would be when it gets posted and then we’ll send it to you for a final check. We’re also several months out in terms of the queue of those that are going to be posted, so it won’t be immediate. Good. We’ve posted about 50 of these, but we’ve done another 20 that are in various stages of being made ready. We’ve sent them out but haven’t gotten them back yet because everybody’s so busy. We do have a last question and that is do you have a favorite quote? One that you find meaningful, or witty, or clever, that kind of thing? I did think about it. Sometimes you asked the question in the online ones about inspirational quotes and this is definitely not inspirational. It doesn’t have to be. I was hoping that because you didn’t say it here. My favorite quote is one my mom said a lot when I was growing up. She always attributed it to her father. I actually looked it up on the web, because I would have thought Mark Twain perhaps said it. It doesn’t seem that anybody famous has said it though. The reference is in a book from just ten years ago. The quote is: “The reward for good work is more work.” Ah, I like that. That’s clever and witty and seems to be true. Right. One of my favorite quotes which I don’t think I put into my post because there’s so many of them is from Mike Griffin, former NASA Administrator. He was talking with the press, I think about risk management and why we do things that don’t always work out. He was explaining that there’s always a risk, and if you don’t accept the risk, then you don’t make progress, but they kept questioning him and pushing back on that idea. And he said, “I can explain it to you, but I can’t understand it for you.” And I thought, that’s a good line! Anyway, you ran the table here on the questions and I appreciate that you prepared ahead of time and wrote some notes down, which made the interview go very well. As I said, I prefer the written word. I’m not as good at thinking on my feet. Is there something that you wish we had asked or had put down as a topic that we didn’t, that you would like to add here? And you can certainly add or change anything when we send this back. There’s a note on the transcript that you have full creative control. So if you wanted to say something but didn’t, you can type in an entire extra paragraph or extra question, or remove and cut out an entire section. And with that, I’ll take the recording and start putting it on a paper and within a couple of weeks, I’ll send you the initial draft and then you can do with it as you wish and send any pictures or anything that relate to things that you talked about and then we’ll get it ready and put it in the queue and eventually you’ll get perhaps a few of your entitled 15 minutes of fame when this goes up. I will add that it goes up on the public side of the of the website so that your family or your friends, anybody can access it and read it. So if somebody googles names of interviews you’ve done, the links to the interviews come up. Well, I hope that doesn’t cause you heartburn. I’ve thought about that as I was phrasing my answers, and changed some passwords so I can include names in the photo captions I hadn’t thought of that aspect of it, but you’re probably right. Yeah. I never know what’s going to touch someone’s concerns. Well, just to be careful. (Mark) There’s another thing that even after we publish, we can still edit them years into the future. Everything on the main sites can be changed at any given moment. Also, Fred, just to note, our interviews rank pretty high on the Google rankings. Usually when you Google someone’s name and then NASA, our interviews are near the top of their results, like on the first screen that comes up. (Fred) Oh, really? I didn’t know that. (Mark) Yeah. This is a pretty good series, people check it out a lot. Which means that people googling names are clicking on the interviews and reading them. (Mark) People read these a lot. (Fred) The other series I do for the website is “Interesting Fact of the Month”. Steve Howell suggested that would be a nice addition as we try to attract traffic to the website, and I heard a year or so ago that it was the top item on the code ST website, it got the most hits. (Mark) Yes, you’ve got spots one and two on your side projects! (Fred) Well, Sean, I appreciate that you were able to overcome your initial hesitation and take the time to work with us on this and I think you’ll be pleased with how it comes out. Thank you very much for being so organized. Thank you for your time. Interview conducted by Fred Van Wert and Mark Vorobets on June 29, 2023 View the full article

3 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) A team from University High School of Irvine, California, won the 2025 regional Science Bowl at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on March 1. From left, co-coach Nick Brighton, sophomores Shloke Kamat and Timothy Chen, juniors Feodor Yevtushenko and Angelina Yan, senior Sara Yu, and coach David Knight.NASA/JPL-Caltech In a fast-paced competition, students showcased their knowledge across a wide range of science and math topics. What is the molecular geometry of sulfur tetrafluoride? Which layer of the Sun is thickest? What is the average of the first 10 prime numbers? If you answered “see-saw,” “radiation zone,” and “12.9,” respectively, then you know a tiny fraction of what high school students must learn to compete successfully in the National Science Bowl. On Saturday, March 1, students from University High School in Irvine answered enough of these kind of challenging questions correctly to earn the points to defeat 19 other high school teams, winning a regional Science Bowl competition hosted by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. Troy High, from Fullerton, won second place, while Arcadia High placed third. Some 100 students gathered at JPL for the fast-paced event, which drew schools from across Los Angeles, Orange, and San Bernardino counties. Teams are composed of four students and one alternate, with a teacher serving as coach. Two teams at a time face off in a round robin tournament, followed by tie-breaker and double-elimination rounds, then final matches. Students, coaches, and volunteers gathered on March 1 for the annual regional Science Bowl competition held at JPL, which has hosted the event since 1993.NASA/JPL-Caltech The questions — in biology, chemistry, Earth and space science, energy, mathematics, and physics — are at a college first-year level. Students spend months preparing, studying, quizzing each other, and practicing with “Jeopardy!”-style buzzers. It was the third year in a row for a University victory at the JPL-hosted event, and the championship round with Troy was a nail-biter until the very last question. The University team only had one returning student from the previous year’s team, junior Feodor Yevtushenko. Both he and longtime team coach and science teacher David Knight said the key to success is specialization — with each student focusing on particular topic areas. “I wake up and grind math before school,” Feodor said. “Being a jack-of-all-trades means you’re a jack-of-no-trades. You need ruthless precision and ruthless speed.” University also won for four years in row from 2018 to 2021. The school’s victory this year enables its team to travel to Washington in late April and vie for ultimate dominance alongside other regional event winners in the national finals. More than 10,000 students compete in some 115 regional events held across the country. Managed by the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Science Bowl was created in 1991 to make math and science fun for students, and to encourage them to pursue careers in those fields. It’s one of the largest academic competitions in the United States. JPL’s Public Services Office coordinates the regional contest with the help of volunteers from laboratory staff and former Science Bowl participants in the local community. This year marked JPL’s 33rd hosting the event. News Media Contact Melissa Pamer Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 626-314-4928 melissa.pamer@jpl.nasa.gov 2025-030 Share Details Last Updated Mar 03, 2025 Related TermsJet Propulsion LaboratorySTEM Engagement at NASA Explore More 3 min read NASA Uses New Technology to Understand California Wildfires Article 3 days ago 6 min read NASA’s Europa Clipper Uses Mars to Go the Distance Article 6 days ago 6 min read How NASA’s Lunar Trailblazer Will Make a Looping Voyage to the Moon Article 3 weeks ago Keep Exploring Discover Related Topics Missions Humans in Space Climate Change Solar System View the full article

NASA In this 1957 photo, George Cooper, a test pilot for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, or NACA, stands next to a North American F-100, a supersonic fighter tested by the NACA. Cooper served as a pilot in World War II before being hired at the NACA’s Ames Aeronautical Laboratory in 1945. Between 1945 and his retirement in 1973, Cooper tested over 135 aircraft, routinely pushing them to their limits. On March 3, 1915, the NACA was established by Congress to “supervise and direct the scientific study of the problems of flight, with a view to their practical solution.” Over the course of its 43 years, the NACA became home to many of the nation’s best and brightest aeronautical engineers and world-class facilities. America’s flight capabilities for military and commercial uses were advanced through its cutting-edge research. It was upon this foundation that America’s civilian space agency was built. With the passing of the Space Act in 1958, the NACA was transformed into NASA and tasked with researching problems of flight in both the air and in space. Celebrate the 110th anniversary of the founding of the NACA with a new video series. Image credit: NASA View the full article

NASA’s Space X Crew-9 members pose together for a portrait.Credit: NASA Students from Ohio and Texas will have the chance to hear NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station answer their prerecorded questions this week. At 12:55 p.m. EST, Wednesday, March 5, NASA astronauts Suni Williams, Nick Hague, Butch Wilmore, and Don Pettit will respond to questions submitted by students from Puede Network, in partnership with The Achievery in Dallas. At 10:30 a.m., Thursday, March 6, a separate call with NASA astronauts Williams, Hague, and Wilmore, will answer questions posed by students at Saint Ambrose Catholic School in Brunswick, Ohio. Watch the 20-minute space-to-Earth calls on NASA+. Learn how to watch NASA content on various platforms, including social media. The Puede Network, a Dallas-based youth organization, is collaborating with the Achievery, an online platform for connecting students with digital learning opportunities. Media interested in covering the event must RSVP by 5 p.m. Tuesday, March 4 to Rodrigo Oshiro at: rodrigo@happytogether.studio or +54 9 113068 7121. Saint Ambrose Catholic School, part of Saint Ambrose Catholic Church, is a preschool through 8th grade school focused on science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics. Media interested in covering the event must RVSP by 5 p.m., Wednesday, March 5 to Breanne Logue at: BLogue@StASchool.us or 330-460-7318. For more than 24 years, astronauts have continuously lived and worked aboard the space station, testing technologies, performing science, and developing skills needed to explore farther from Earth. Astronauts aboard the orbiting laboratory communicate with NASA’s Mission Control Center in Houston 24 hours a day through SCaN’s (Space Communications and Navigation) Near Space Network. Important research and technology investigations taking place aboard the space station benefit people on Earth and lays the groundwork for other agency missions. As part of NASA’s Artemis campaign, the agency will send astronauts to the Moon to prepare for future human exploration of Mars, inspiring Artemis Generation explorers and ensuring the United States continues to lead in space exploration and discovery. See videos and lesson plans highlighting space station research at: https://www.nasa.gov/stemonstation -end- Abbey Donaldson Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1600 abbey.a.donaldson@nasa.gov Sandra Jones Johnson Space Center, Houston 281-483-5111 sandra.p.jones@nasa.gov Share Details Last Updated Mar 03, 2025 EditorJessica TaveauLocationNASA Headquarters Related TermsIn-flight Education DownlinksFor Colleges & UniversitiesLearning ResourcesOutside the Classroom View the full article

Preventing biofilm formation in space Ashley Keeley, University of Idaho, holds an anti-bacterial coating sample.University of Idaho Student Payload Opportunity with Citizen Science Team Two anti-microbial coatings reduced formation of biofilms in microgravity and have potential for use in space. Controlling biofilms could help protect human health and prevent corrosion and degradation of equipment on future long-duration space missions. Biofilms, communities of microorganisms that attach to a surface, can damage mechanical systems and present a risk of disease transmission. Bacteria Resistant Polymers in Space examined how microgravity affects polymer materials designed to prevent or reduce biofilm formation. Better anti-fouling coatings also could reduce disease transmission on Earth. Evaluating organ changes in lunar gravity Set up for the Mouse Epigenetics experiment aboard the International Space Station. NASA Researchers found different changes in gene expression and other responses to simulated lunar gravity levels in specific organs. This finding could help determine safe gravity thresholds and support development of ways to maintain skeletal and immune function on future space journeys. Spaceflight can affect skeletal and immune system function, but the molecular mechanisms of these changes are not clear. Mouse Epigenetics, a JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) investigation, studied gene expression changes in mice that spent a month in space and in the DNA of their offspring. Results could help determine spaceflight’s long-term effects on genetic activity, including changes within individual organs and those that can be inherited later. Performance report for cosmic ray observatory The CALorimetric Electron Telescope instrument is visible on the far left of the space station’s Kibo laboratory module. JAXA (Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency)/Norishige Kanai Researchers report on-orbit performance from the first 8 years of operation of the International Space Station’s cosmic ray observatory, CALET. The instrument has provided valuable data on cosmic ray, proton, and helium spectra; produced a gamma-ray sky map; observed gamma-ray bursts; and searched for gravitational wave counterparts and solar effects. The JAXA CALorimetric Electron Telescope or CALET helps address questions such as the origin and acceleration of cosmic rays and the existence of dark matter and nearby cosmic-ray sources. The instrument also could help characterize risks from the radiation environment that humans and electronics experience in space. View the full article

On March 3, 1915, the United States Congress created the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). Although the NACA’s founding took place just over 11 years after the Wright Brothers’ first powered flightfirst powered flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Congress took the action in response to America lagging behind other world powers’ advances in aviation and aeronautics. From its modest beginnings as an advisory committee, over the years, the NACA established research centers and test facilities that enabled groundbreaking advances in civilian and military aviation, as well as the fledgling discipline of spaceflight. With the creation of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in 1958, the new agency incorporated the NACA’s facilities, its employees, and its annual budget. The NACA provided NASA with a strong foundation as it set out to explore space. The first meeting of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics on April 23, 1915.NASA The NACA executive committee in 1934. NASA The Congressional action that created the NACA, implemented as a rider to the 1915 Naval Appropriations Bill, reads in part, “…It shall be the duty of the advisory committee for aeronautics to supervise and direct the scientific study of the problems of flight with a view to their practical solution. …”. In its initial years, the NACA fulfilled its intended role, coordinating activities already in place in the area of aeronautics research, reporting directly to the president. The committee, made up of 12 representatives from government agencies, academia, and the military, first met on April 23 in the Office of the Secretary of War in Washington, D.C. It established a nine-member executive committee to oversee day-to-day operations and spent the first few years establishing its headquarters in Washington. The committee’s logo, approved in 1941.NASA The committee’s seal, approved by presidential executive order in 1953.NASA Hangars at the Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory in Hampton, Virginia, in 1931. NASA The Variable Density Tunnel at Langley. NASA Aerial view of the Ames Aeronautical Laboratory in Sunnyvale, California, in 1944. NASA Aerial view of the Aircraft Engine Research Laboratory in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1945.NASA Within a few years, the NACA’s role began to expand with the establishment of research facilities. The Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory, today NASA’s Langley Research Center, in Hampton, Virginia, opened on June 11, 1920. Over the next few decades, Langley served as a testing facility for new types of aircraft, using wind tunnels and other technological advances. The Ames Aeronautical Laboratory in Sunnyvale, California, today NASA’s Ames Research Center, opened in 1940 and the Aircraft Engine Research Laboratory in Cleveland, today NASA’s Glenn Research Center, in 1941. The three labs achieved many breakthroughs in civilian and military aviation before, during, and after World War II. The Cleveland lab, renamed the Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory in 1948, concentrated most of its efforts on advances in jet propulsion. The NACA High-Speed Flight Station, now NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center, at Edwards Air Force Base in California’s Mojave Desert. NASA The Bell X-1, the first aircraft to break the sound barrier in 1947.NASA The first sounding rocket launch from the Pilotless Aircraft Research Station at Wallops Island, Virginia, in 1945.NASA After World War II, the NACA began work on achieving supersonic flight. In 1946, the agency established the Muroc Flight Test Unit at the Air Force’s Muroc Field, later renamed Edwards Air Force Base, in California’s Mojave Desert. In a close collaboration, the NACA, the Air Force, and Bell Aircraft developed the X-1 airplane that first broke the sound barrier in 1947. Muroc Field underwent several name changes, first to the High-Speed Flight Station in 1949, then in 1976 to NASA’s Dryden, and in 2014 to Armstrong Flight Research Center. In 1945, the NACA established the Pilotless Aircraft Research Station on Wallops Island, Virginia, now NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, as a test site for rocketry research, under Langley’s direction. From the first launch in 1945 through 1958, the NACA launched nearly 400 different types of rockets from Wallops. Shadowgraph of finned hemispherical model in free flight shows shock waves produced by blunt bodies.NACA Meeting of the NACA’s Special Committee on Space Technology in May 1958.NASA In the 1950s, the NACA began to study the feasibility of spaceflight, including sending humans into space. In 1952, NACA engineers developed the concept of a blunt body capsule as the most efficient way to return humans from space. The design concept found its way into the Mercury capsule and all future American spacecraft. Following the dawn of the space age in 1957, the NACA advocated that it take the lead in America’s spaceflight effort. The Congress passed, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed legislation to create a new civilian space agency, and on Oct. 1, 1958, NASA officially began operations. The new organization incorporated the NACA’s research laboratories and test facilities, its 8,000 employees, and its $100 million annual budget. Many of NASA’s key early leaders and engineers began their careers in the NACA. The NACA’s last director, Hugh Dryden, served as NASA’s first deputy administrator. For more information about the NACA and its transition to NASA, read former NASA Chief Historian Roger Launius’ book NASA to NASA to Now: The Frontiers of Air and Space in the American Century. Watch this video narrated by former NASA Chief Historian Bill Barry about the NACA. Explore More 7 min read 65 Years Ago: The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 Creates NASA Article 2 years ago 4 min read 65 Years Ago: Eisenhower Nominates Glennan and Dryden to Top NASA Positions Article 2 years ago 6 min read 65 Years Ago: NASA Begins Operations Article 1 year ago 7 min read 65 Years Ago: The International Geophysical Year Begins Article 3 years ago View the full article

On Feb. 28, 1990, space shuttle Atlantis took off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on STS-36, the sixth shuttle mission dedicated to the Department of Defense. As such, many of the details of the flight remain classified. The mission marked the 34th flight of the space shuttle, the sixth for Atlantis, and the fourth night launch of the program. The crew of Commander John Creighton, Pilot John Casper, Mission Specialists Mike Mullane, David Hilmers, and Pierre Thuot flew Atlantis to the highest inclination orbit of any human spaceflight to date. During the four-day mission, the astronauts deployed a classified satellite, ending with a landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California. The STS-36 crew, from left, was Mission Specialist Pierre Thuot, left, Pilot John Casper, Commander John Creighton, and Mission Specialists Mike Mullane and David Hilmers.NASA The STS-36 crew patch. NASA In February 1989, NASA assigned astronauts Creighton, Casper, Mullane, Hilmers, and Thuot to the STS-36 mission. The mission marked the second spaceflight for Creighton, selected as an astronaut in 1978. He previously served as the pilot on STS-51G. Mullane, also from the class of 1978, previously flew on STS-41D and STS-27, while Hilmers, from the class of 1980, previously flew on STS-51J and STS-26. For Casper and Thuot, selected as astronauts in the classes of 1984 and 1985, respectively, STS-36 marked their first trip into space. The STS-36 crew poses outside the crew compartment trainer at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. NASA Space shuttle Atlantis during the rollout to Launch Pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.NASA The STS-36 crew participates in a simulation.NASA STS-36 Commander John Creighton and Pilot John Casper in the shuttle simulator. NASA The STS-36 crew exits crew quarters for the ride to Launch Pad 39A.NASA Atlantis returned from its previous flight, STS-34, in October 1989. The orbiter spent a then-record 75 days in the processing facility and assembly building, rolling out to Launch Pad 39A on Jan. 25, 1990. The astronauts arrived on Feb. 18 for the planned launch four days later. First Creighton, then Casper and Hilmers, came down with colds, delaying the launch to Feb. 25. Weather and hardware problems pushed the launch back to Feb. 28, giving the astronauts time to return to Houston for some simulator training. On launch day, winds and rain delayed the liftoff for more than two hours before launch controllers gave Atlantis the go to launch. Liftoff of space shuttle Atlantis on STS-36. NASA With mere seconds remaining in the launch window, Atlantis lifted off at 2:50 a.m. EST Feb. 28, to begin the STS-36 mission. Atlantis flew an unusual dog leg maneuver during ascent to achieve the mission’s 62-degree inclination. Once Atlantis reached orbit, the classified nature prevented any more detailed public coverage of the mission. The astronauts likely deployed the classified satellite on the mission’s second day. During the remainder of their mission, the astronauts conducted several experiments and photographed preselected areas and targets of opportunity on planet Earth. Their high-inclination orbit enabled them to photograph areas not usually seen by shuttle crews. In-flight photo of the STS-36 crew on Atlantis’ flight deck.NASA STS-36 crew members David Hilmers, left, Pierre Thuot, and John Casper work in the shuttle’s middeck. NASA Mission Specialist Mike Mullane takes photographs from Atlantis’ flight deck.NASA A selection of crew Earth observation photographs from STS-36. The coast of Greenland.NASA New York City at night.NASA The Nile River including Cairo and the Giza pyramidsNASA The coast of Antarctica. NASA John Creighton prepares drink bags for prelanding hydration. NASA Atlantis touches down at Edwards Air Force Base in California. NASA NASA officials greet the STS-36 astronauts as they exit Atlantis.NASA To maintain the mission’s confidentiality, NASA could reveal the touchdown time only 24 hours prior to the event. On March 4, Creighton and Casper brought Atlantis to a smooth landing at Edwards Air Force Base after 72 orbits of the Earth and a flight of four days, 10 hours, and 18 minutes. About an hour after touchdown, the astronaut crew exited Atlantis for the ride to crew quarters and the flight back to Houston. Later in the day, ground crews prepared Atlantis for the ferry ride back to Kennedy. Atlantis left Edwards on March 10 and three days later arrived at Kennedy, where workers began to prepare it for its next flight, STS-38 in November 1990. Explore More 14 min read 40 Years Ago: STS-4, Columbia’s Final Orbital Flight Test Article 3 years ago 6 min read 40 Years Ago: STS-51C, the First Dedicated Department of Defense Shuttle Mission Article 1 month ago 18 min read 40 Years Ago: NASA Selects its 10th Group of Astronauts Article 9 months ago View the full article

1 min read An Ocean in Motion: NASA’s Mesmerizing View of Earth’s Underwater Highways Earth (ESD) Earth Explore Explore Earth Science Climate Change Science in Action Multimedia Image Collections Videos Data For Researchers About Us This data visualization showing ocean currents around the world uses data from NASA’s ECCO model, or Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean. The model pulls data from spacecraft, buoys, and other measurements. Original Video and Assets Share Details Last Updated Mar 03, 2025 Editor Earth Science Division Editorial Team Related Terms Oceans Earth Video Series Explore More 8 min read Going With the Flow: Visualizing Ocean Currents with ECCO NASA scientists and collaborators built the ECCO model to be the most realistic, detailed, and… Article 51 mins ago 2 min read Newly Minted Ph.D. Studies Phytoplankton with NASA’s FjordPhyto Project Article 3 weeks ago 1 min read 2024 is the Warmest Year on Record Earth’s average surface temperature in 2024 was the warmest on record. Article 2 months ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Earth Your home. Our Mission. And the one planet that NASA studies more than any other. Climate Change NASA is a global leader in studying Earth’s changing climate. Explore Earth Science Earth Science in Action NASA’s unique vantage point helps us inform solutions to enhance decision-making, improve livelihoods, and protect our planet. View the full article

Earth (ESD) Earth Explore Explore Earth Science Climate Change Science in Action Multimedia Image Collections Videos Data For Researchers About Us 8 Min Read Going With the Flow: Visualizing Ocean Currents with ECCO The North American Gulf Stream as illustrated with the ECCO model. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio Historically, the ocean has been difficult to model. Scientists struggled in years past to simulate ocean currents or accurately predict fluctuations in temperature, salinity, and other properties. As a result, models of ocean dynamics rapidly diverged from reality, which meant they could only provide useful information for brief periods. In 1999, a project called Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean (ECCO) changed all that. By applying the laws of physics to data from multiple satellites and thousands of floating sensors, NASA scientists and their collaborators built ECCO to be a realistic, detailed, and continuous ocean model that spans decades. ECCO enabled thousands of scientific discoveries, and was featured during the announcement of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2021. NASA ECCO is a powerful integrator of decades of ocean data, narrating the story of Earth’s changing ocean as it drives our weather, and sustains marine life. The ECCO project includes hundreds of millions of real-world measurements of temperature, salinity, sea ice concentration, pressure, water height, and flow in the world’s oceans. Researchers rely on the model output to study ocean dynamics and to keep tabs on conditions that are crucial for ecosystems and weather patterns. The modeling effort is supported by NASA’s Earth science programs and by the international ECCO consortium, which includes researchers from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California and eight research institutions and universities. The project provides models that are the best possible reconstruction of the past 30 years of the global ocean. It allows us to understand the ocean’s physical processes at scales that are not normally observable. ECCO and the Western Boundary Currents Western boundary currents stand out in white in this visualization built with ECCO data. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio Large-scale wind patterns around the globe drag ocean surface waters with them, creating complex currents, including some that flow toward the western sides of the ocean basins. The currents hug the eastern coasts of continents as they head north or south from the equator: These are the western boundary currents. The three most prominent are the Gulf Stream, Agulhas, and Kuroshio. NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. The North American Gulf Stream as illustrated with the ECCO model. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio Seafarers have known about the Gulf Stream — the Atlantic Ocean’s western boundary current — for more than 500 years. By the volume of water it moves, the Gulf Stream is the largest of the western boundary currents, transporting more water than all the planet’s rivers combined. In 1785, Benjamin Franklin added it to maritime charts showing the current flowing up from the Gulf, along the eastern U.S. coast, and out across the North Atlantic. Franklin noted that riding the current could improve a ship’s travel time from the Americas to Europe, while avoiding the current could shorten travel times when sailing back. A visualization built of ECCO data reveals a cold, deep countercurrent that flows in the opposite direction of the warm Gulf Stream above it. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio Franklin’s charts showed a smooth Gulf Stream rather than the twisted, swirling path revealed in ECCO data. And Franklin couldn’t have imagined the opposing flow of water below the Gulf Stream. The countercurrent runs at depths of about 2,000 feet (600 meters) in a cold river of water that is roughly the opposite of the warm Gulf Stream at the surface. The submarine countercurrent is clearly visible when the upper layers in the ECCO model are peeled away in visualizations. The Gulf Stream is a part of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), which moderates climate worldwide by transporting warm surface waters north and cool underwater currents south. The Gulf Stream, in particular, stabilizes temperatures of the southeastern United States, keeping the region warmer in winter and cooler in summer than it would be without the current. After the Gulf Stream crosses the Atlantic, it tempers the climates of England and the European coast as well. The Agulhas current originates along the equator in the Indian Ocean, travels down the western coast of Africa, and spawns swirling Agulhas rings that travel across the Atlantic toward South America. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio The Agulhas Current flows south along the western side of the Indian Ocean. When it reaches the southern tip of Africa, it sheds swirling vortices of water called Agulhas Rings. Sometimes persisting for years, the rings glide across the Atlantic toward South America, transporting small fish, larvae, and other microorganisms from the Indian Ocean. Researchers using the ECCO model can study Agulhas Current flow as it sends warm, salty water from the tropics in the Indian Ocean toward the tip of South Africa. The model helps tease out the complicated dynamics that create the Agulhas rings and large loop of current called a supergyre that surrounds the Antarctic. The Southern Hemisphere supergyre links the southern portions of other, smaller current loops (gyres) that circulate in the southern Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans. Together with gyres in the northern Atlantic and Pacific, the southern gyres and Southern Hemisphere supergyre influence climate while transporting carbon around the globe. The Kuroshio Current flows on the western side of the Pacific Ocean, past the east coast of Japan, east across the Pacific, and north toward the Arctic. Along the way, it provides warm water to drive seasonal storms, while also creating ocean upwellings that carry nutrients that sustain fisheries off the coasts of Taiwan and northern Japan. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio In addition to affecting global weather patterns and temperatures, western boundary currents can drive vertical flows in the oceans known as upwellings. The flows bring nutrients up from the depths to the surface, where they act as fertilizer for phytoplankton, algae, and aquatic plants. The Kuroshio Current that runs on the west side of the Pacific Ocean and along the east side of Japan has recently been associated with upwellings that enrich coastal fishing waters. The specific mechanisms that cause the vertical flows are not entirely clear. Ocean scientists are now turning to ECCO to tease out the connection between nutrient transport and currents like the Kuroshio that might be revealed in studies of the water temperature, density, pressure, and other factors included in the ECCO model. Tracking Ocean Temperatures and Salinity When viewed through the lens of ECCO’s temperature data, western boundary currents carry warm water away from the tropics and toward the poles. In the case of the Gulf Stream, as the current moves to far northern latitudes, some of the saltwater freezes into salt-free sea ice. The saltier water left behind sinks and then flows south all the way toward the Antarctic before rising and warming in other ocean basins. Colors indicate temperature in this visualization of ECCO data. Warm water near the equator is bright yellow. Water cools when it flows toward the poles, indicated by the transition to orange and red shades farther from the equator. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio Currents also move nutrients and salt throughout Earth’s ocean basins. Swirling vortexes of the Agulhas rings stand out in ECCO temperature and salinity maps as they move warm, salty water from the Indian Ocean into the Atlantic. The Mediterranean Sea has a dark red hue that indicates its high salt content. Other than the flow through the narrow Strait of Gibraltar, the Mediterranean is cut off from the rest of the world’s oceans. Because of this restricted flow, salinity increases in the Mediterranean as its waters warm and evaporate, making it one of the saltiest parts of the global ocean. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Greg Shirah/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio Experimenting with ECCO ECCO offers researchers a way to run virtual experiments that would be impractical or too costly to perform in real oceans. Some of the most important applications of the ECCO model are in ocean ecology, biology, and chemistry. Because the model shows where the water comes from and where it goes, researchers can see how currents transport heat, minerals, nutrients, and organisms around the planet. In prior decades, for example, ocean scientists relied on extensive temperature and salinity measurements by floating sensors to deduce that the Gulf Stream is primarily made of water flowing past the Gulf rather than through it. The studies were time-consuming and expensive. With the ECCO model, data visualizers at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, virtually replicated the research in a simulation that was far quicker and cheaper. A simulation built with data from the ECCO model shows that very little of the water in the gulf contributes to the water flowing in the Gulf Stream. Download this visualization from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio. Credits: Atousa Saberi/NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio The example illustrated here relies on ECCO to track the flow of water by virtually filling the Gulf with 115,000 particles and letting them move for a year in the model. The demonstration showed that less than 1% of the particles escape the Gulf to join the Gulf Stream. Running such particle-tracking experiments within the ocean circulation models helps scientists understand how and where environmental contaminants, such as oil spills, can spread. Take an ECCO Deep Dive Today, researchers turn to ECCO for a broad array of studies. They can choose ECCO modeling products that focus on one feature – such as global flows or the biology and chemistry of the ocean – or they can narrow the view to the poles or specific ocean regions. Every year, more than a hundred scientific papers include data and analyses from the ECCO model that delve into our oceans’ properties and dynamics. Credits: Kathleen Gaeta Greer/ NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio Composed by James Riordon / NASA’s Earth Science News Team Information in this piece came from the resources below and interviews with the following sources: Nadya Vinogradova Shiffer, Dimitris Menemenlis, Ian Fenty, and Atousa Saberi. References and Sources Liao, F., Liang, X., Li, Y., & Spall, M. (2022). Hidden upwelling systems associated with major western boundary currents. Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans, 127(3), e2021JC017649. Richardson, P. L. (1980). The Benjamin Franklin and Timothy Folger charts of the Gulf Stream. In Oceanography: The Past: Proceedings of the Third International Congress on the History of Oceanography, held September 22–26, 1980 at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, USA on the occasion of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the founding of the Institution (pp. 703-717). New York, NY: Springer New York. Biastoch, A., Rühs, S., Ivanciu, I., Schwarzkopf, F. U., Veitch, J., Reason, C., … & Soltau, F. (2024). The Agulhas Current System as an Important Driver for Oceanic and Terrestrial Climate. In Sustainability of Southern African Ecosystems under Global Change: Science for Management and Policy Interventions (pp. 191-220). Cham: Springer International Publishing. Lee-Sánchez, E., Camacho-Ibar, V. F., Velásquez-Aristizábal, J. A., Valencia-Gasti, J. A., & Samperio-Ramos, G. (2022). Impacts of mesoscale eddies on the nitrate distribution in the deep-water region of the Gulf of Mexico. Journal of Marine Systems, 229, 103721. Share Details Last Updated Mar 03, 2025 Editor Michael Carlowicz Contact James Riordon Related Terms Oceans Earth Explore More 1 min read An Ocean in Motion: NASA’s Mesmerizing View of Earth’s Underwater Highways This data visualization showing ocean currents around the world uses data from NASA’s Estimating the… Article 6 mins ago 2 min read Newly Minted Ph.D. Studies Phytoplankton with NASA’s FjordPhyto Project Article 3 weeks ago 1 min read 2024 is the Warmest Year on Record Earth’s average surface temperature in 2024 was the warmest on record. Article 2 months ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Earth Your home. Our Mission. And the one planet that NASA studies more than any other. Climate Change NASA is a global leader in studying Earth’s changing climate. Explore Earth Science Earth Science in Action NASA’s unique vantage point helps us inform solutions to enhance decision-making, improve livelihoods, and protect our planet. View the full article

Official NASA portrait of Norman D. Knight. Credit: NASA NASA has selected Norman Knight as acting deputy director of Johnson Space Center. Knight currently serves as Director of Johnson’s Flight Operations Directorate (FOD), responsible for astronaut training and for overall planning, directing, managing, and implementing overall mission operations for NASA human spaceflight programs. This also includes management for all Johnson aircraft operations and aircrew training. Knight will serve in this dual deputy director and FOD director role for the near term. “It is an honor to accept my new role as acting deputy director for Johnson,” Knight said. “Human spaceflight is key to our agency’s mission and our Johnson team is unified in that goal. The successes we see every day are the evidence of that. It never ceases to amaze me what our team is capable of.” Knight began his career at the Johnson Space Center as a Space Shuttle mechanical systems flight controller, working 40 missions in this capacity. He progressed through management roles with increasing responsibility, and in 2000, he was selected as a flight director and worked in that capacity for numerous International Space Station expeditions and Space Shuttle missions. In 2009, he became the deputy chief of the Flight Director Office and participated in a NASA fellowship at Harvard Business School in general management. In 2012, Knight was selected as the chief of the Flight Director Office and then in 2018 as deputy director of the Flight Operations Directorate after serving a temporary assignment as the assistant administrator, Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters. In 2021, Knight was selected as the director of FOD. “Norm has an accomplished career within the agency,” said Steven Koerner, Johnson acting director. “His leadership, expertise, and dedication to the mission will undoubtably drive our continued success.” Throughout his career, Knight has been recognized for outstanding technical achievements and leadership, receiving a Spaceflight Awareness Honoree award for STS-82. He also received several center and agency awards, including two Exceptional Achievement medals, multiple Johnson and agency group achievement awards, two Superior Accomplishment awards, an Outstanding Leadership medal, the Johnson Director’s Commendation award, and the Distinguished Service medal. Knight earned a bachelor’s degree in aeronautical engineering from the Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in 1990. View the full article

Explore This Section Webb News Latest News Latest Images Blog (offsite) Awards X (offsite – login reqd) Instagram (offsite – login reqd) Facebook (offsite- login reqd) Youtube (offsite) Overview About Who is James Webb? Fact Sheet Impacts+Benefits FAQ Science Overview and Goals Early Universe Galaxies Over Time Star Lifecycle Other Worlds Observatory Overview Launch Orbit Mirrors Sunshield Instrument: NIRCam Instrument: MIRI Instrument: NIRSpec Instrument: FGS/NIRISS Optical Telescope Element Backplane Spacecraft Bus Instrument Module Multimedia About Webb Images Images Videos What is Webb Observing? 3d Webb in 3d Solar System Podcasts Webb Image Sonifications Team International Team People Of Webb More For the Media For Scientists For Educators For Fun/Learning 6 Min Read NASA’s Webb Exposes Complex Atmosphere of Starless Super-Jupiter This artist’s concept shows what the isolated planetary-mass object SIMP 0136 could look like based on recent observations from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and previous observations from Hubble, Spitzer, and numerous ground-based telescopes. Credits: NASA, ESA, CSA, and Joseph Olmsted (STScI) An international team of researchers has discovered that previously observed variations in brightness of a free-floating planetary-mass object known as SIMP 0136 must be the result of a complex combination of atmospheric factors, and cannot be explained by clouds alone. Using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to monitor a broad spectrum of infrared light emitted over two full rotation periods by SIMP 0136, the team was able to detect variations in cloud layers, temperature, and carbon chemistry that were previously hidden from view. The results provide crucial insight into the three-dimensional complexity of gas giant atmospheres within and beyond our solar system. Detailed characterization of objects like these is essential preparation for direct imaging of exoplanets, planets outside our solar system, with NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, which is scheduled to begin operations in 2027. Rapidly Rotating, Free-Floating SIMP 0136 is a rapidly rotating, free-floating object roughly 13 times the mass of Jupiter, located in the Milky Way just 20 light-years from Earth. Although it is not classified as a gas giant exoplanet — it doesn’t orbit a star and may instead be a brown dwarf — SIMP 0136 is an ideal target for exo-meteorology: It is the brightest object of its kind in the northern sky. Because it is isolated, it can be observed with no fear of light contamination or variability caused by a host star. And its short rotation period of just 2.4 hours makes it possible to survey very efficiently. Prior to the Webb observations, SIMP 0136 had been studied extensively using ground-based observatories and NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes. “We already knew that it varies in brightness, and we were confident that there are patchy cloud layers that rotate in and out of view and evolve over time,” explained Allison McCarthy, doctoral student at Boston University and lead author on a study published today in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. “We also thought there could be temperature variations, chemical reactions, and possibly some effects of auroral activity affecting the brightness, but we weren’t sure.” To figure it out, the team needed Webb’s ability to measure very precise changes in brightness over a broad range of wavelengths. Graphic A: Isolated Planetary-Mass Object SIMP 0136 (Artist’s Concept) This artist’s concept shows what the isolated planetary-mass object SIMP 0136 could look like based on recent observations from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and previous observations from Hubble, Spitzer, and numerous ground-based telescopes. Researchers used Webb’s NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph) and MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) to measure subtle changes in the brightness of infrared light as the object completed two 2.4-hour rotations. By analyzing the change in brightness of different wavelengths over time, they were able to detect variability in cloud cover at different depths, temperature variations in the upper atmosphere, and changes in carbon chemistry as different sides of the object rotated in and out of view. This illustration is based on Webb’s spectroscopic observations. Webb has not captured a direct image of the object. NASA, ESA, CSA, and Joseph Olmsted (STScI) Charting Thousands of Infrared Rainbows Using NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph), Webb captured thousands of individual 0.6- to 5.3-micron spectra — one every 1.8 seconds over more than three hours as the object completed one full rotation. This was immediately followed by an observation with MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument), which collected hundreds of spectroscopic measurements of 5- to 14-micron light — one every 19.2 seconds, over another rotation. The result was hundreds of detailed light curves, each showing the change in brightness of a very precise wavelength (color) as different sides of the object rotated into view. “To see the full spectrum of this object change over the course of minutes was incredible,” said principal investigator Johanna Vos, from Trinity College Dublin. “Until now, we only had a little slice of the near-infrared spectrum from Hubble, and a few brightness measurements from Spitzer.” The team noticed almost immediately that there were several distinct light-curve shapes. At any given time, some wavelengths were growing brighter, while others were becoming dimmer or not changing much at all. A number of different factors must be affecting the brightness variations. “Imagine watching Earth from far away. If you were to look at each color separately, you would see different patterns that tell you something about its surface and atmosphere, even if you couldn’t make out the individual features,” explained co-author Philip Muirhead, also from Boston University. “Blue would increase as oceans rotate into view. Changes in brown and green would tell you something about soil and vegetation.” Graphic B: Isolated Planetary-Mass Object SIMP 0136 (NIRSpec Light Curves) These light curves show the change in brightness of three different sets of wavelengths (colors) of near-infrared light coming from the isolated planetary-mass object SIMP 0136 as it rotated. The light was captured by Webb’s NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph), which collected a total of 5,726 spectra — one every 1.8 seconds — over the course of about 3 hours on July 23, 2023. The variations in brightness are thought to be related to different atmospheric features — deep clouds composed of iron particles, higher clouds made of tiny grains of silicate minerals, and high-altitude hot and cold spots — rotating in and out of view. The diagram at the right illustrates the possible structure of SIMP 0136’s atmosphere, with the colored arrows representing the same wavelengths of light shown in the light curves. Thick arrows represent more (brighter) light; thin arrows represent less (dimmer) light. NASA, ESA, CSA, and Joseph Olmsted (STScI) Patchy Clouds, Hot Spots, and Carbon Chemistry To figure out what could be causing the variability on SIMP 0136, the team used atmospheric models to show where in the atmosphere each wavelength of light was originating. “Different wavelengths provide information about different depths in the atmosphere,” explained McCarthy. “We started to realize that the wavelengths that had the most similar light-curve shapes also probed the same depths, which reinforced this idea that they must be caused by the same mechanism.” One group of wavelengths, for example, originates deep in the atmosphere where there could be patchy clouds made of iron particles. A second group comes from higher clouds thought to be made of tiny grains of silicate minerals. The variations in both of these light curves are related to patchiness of the cloud layers. A third group of wavelengths originates at very high altitude, far above the clouds, and seems to track temperature. Bright “hot spots” could be related to auroras that were previously detected at radio wavelengths, or to upwelling of hot gas from deeper in the atmosphere. Some of the light curves cannot be explained by either clouds or temperature, but instead show variations related to atmospheric carbon chemistry. There could be pockets of carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide rotating in and out of view, or chemical reactions causing the atmosphere to change over time. “We haven’t really figured out the chemistry part of the puzzle yet,” said Vos. “But these results are really exciting because they are showing us that the abundances of molecules like methane and carbon dioxide could change from place to place and over time. If we are looking at an exoplanet and can get only one measurement, we need to consider that it might not be representative of the entire planet.” This research was conducted as part of Webb’s General Observer Program 3548. The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency). Downloads Right click any image to save it or open a larger version in a new tab/window via the browser’s popup menu. View/Download all image products at all resolutions for this article from the Space Telescope Science Institute. View/Download the research results from The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Media Contacts Laura Betz – laura.e.betz@nasa.gov NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. Margaret W. Carruthers – mcarruthers@stsci.edu Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md. Hannah Braun – hbraun@stsci.edu Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md. Related Information More Webb News More Webb Images Webb Science Themes Webb Mission Page Learn more about brown dwarf discoveries Article: Spectroscopy 101 Related For Kids What is the Webb Telescope? SpacePlace for Kids En Español Ciencia de la NASA NASA en español Space Place para niños Keep Exploring Related Topics James Webb Space Telescope Webb is the premier observatory of the next decade, serving thousands of astronomers worldwide. It studies every phase in the… Universe Universe Stories Exoplanets View the full article

2 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) To celebrate the 110th anniversary of the organization that ultimately became NASA, the agency released a new collection of videos to highlight the history of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) and the ways it transformed flight over four decades. A new video collection highlights the history and significance of NASA’s predecessor organization. Not long after the beginning of World War I, the United States Congress, concerned that America was lagging behind other countries, created a new committee to advance the nation’s flight technology development. On March 3, 1915, the NACA was founded “to supervise and direct the scientific study of the problems of flight, with a view to their practical solution.” While the NACA began as a committee of only 12 leaders representing government, military, and industry, it rapidly expanded through World War II to develop America’s flight capabilities for defense and commercial uses. The organization became home to some of the nation’s best and brightest aeronautical engineers and world-class facilities, transforming into NASA at the dawn of the Space Age in 1958. The new video collection highlights some of NACA’s striking historic photography and celebrates this pioneering organization with a brief history of its formation, expansion, and groundbreaking aeronautics research at four centers across the United States — the current homes of NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton Virginia, Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley, Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, and Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California. Related Links The NACA’s 110th Anniversary Feature E-book: NACA to NASA to Now: The Frontiers of Air and Space in the American Century E-book: A Wartime Necessity: The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) and Other National Aeronautical Research Organizations’ Efforts at Innovation During World War II Share Details Last Updated Mar 03, 2025 EditorMichele Ostovar Related TermsNASA HistoryAeronauticsAmes Research CenterArmstrong Flight Research CenterGlenn Research CenterLangley Research CenterNational Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) Explore More 5 min read NASA’s Ames Research Center Celebrates 85 Years of Innovation Article 2 months ago 3 min read NASA Glenn Established in Cleveland in 1941 Article 1 year ago 9 min read From Biplanes to Supersonic Flight Article 10 years ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) Aeronautics NASA History NACA Oral Histories View the full article

First image captured by Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander, taken shortly after confirmation of a successful landing at Mare Crisium on the Moon’s near side. This is the second lunar delivery of NASA science and tech instruments as part of the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative.Credit: Firefly Aerospace Carrying a suite of NASA science and technology, Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 1 successfully landed at 3:34 a.m. EST on Sunday near a volcanic feature called Mons Latreille within Mare Crisium, a more than 300-mile-wide basin located in the northeast quadrant of the Moon’s near side. The Blue Ghost lander is in an upright and stable configuration, and the successful Moon delivery is part of NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative and Artemis campaign. This is the first CLPS delivery for Firefly, and their first Moon landing. The 10 NASA science and technology instruments aboard the lander will operate on the lunar surface for approximately one lunar day, or about 14 Earth days. “This incredible achievement demonstrates how NASA and American companies are leading the way in space exploration for the benefit of all,” said NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro. “We have already learned many lessons – and the technological and science demonstrations onboard Firefly’s Blue Ghost Mission 1 will improve our ability to not only discover more science, but to ensure the safety of our spacecraft instruments for future human exploration – both in the short term and long term.” Since launching from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Jan. 15, Blue Ghost traveled more than 2.8 million miles, downlinked more than 27 GB of data, and supported several science operations. This included signal tracking from the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) at a record-breaking distance of 246,000 miles with the Lunar GNSS Receiver Experiment payload – showing NASA can use the same positioning systems on Earth when at the Moon. Science conducted during the journey also included radiation tolerant computing through the Van Allen Belts with the Radiation-Tolerant Computer System payload and measurements of magnetic field changes in space with the Lunar Magnetotelluric Sounder payload. “The science and technology we send to the Moon now helps prepare the way for future NASA exploration and long-term human presence to inspire the world for generations to come,” said Nicky Fox, associate administrator for science at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “We’re sending these payloads by working with American companies – which supports a growing lunar economy.” During surface operations, the NASA instruments will test and demonstrate lunar subsurface drilling technology, regolith sample collection capabilities, global navigation satellite system abilities, radiation tolerant computing, and lunar dust mitigation methods. The data captured will benefit humanity by providing insights into how space weather and other cosmic forces impact Earth. Before payload operations conclude, teams will aim to capture imagery of the lunar sunset and how lunar dust reacts to solar influences during lunar dusk conditions, a phenomenon first documented by former NASA astronaut Eugene Cernan on Apollo 17. Following the lunar sunset, the lander will operate for several hours into the lunar night. “On behalf of our entire team, I want to thank NASA for entrusting Firefly as their lunar delivery provider,” said Jason Kim, CEO of Firefly Aerospace. “Blue Ghost’s successful Moon landing has laid the groundwork for the future of commercial exploration across cislunar space. We’re now looking forward to more than 14 days of surface operations to unlock even more science data that will have a substantial impact on future missions to the Moon and Mars.” To date, five vendors have been awarded 11 lunar deliveries under CLPS and are sending more than 50 instruments to various locations on the Moon, including the lunar South Pole. Existing CLPS contracts are indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts with a cumulative maximum contract value of $2.6 billion through 2028. Learn more about NASA’s CLPS initiative at: https://www.nasa.gov/clps -end- Amber Jacobson / Karen Fox Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1600 amber.c.jacobson@nasa.gov / karen.c.fox@nasa.gov Natalia Riusech / Nilufar Ramji Johnson Space Center, Houston 281-483-5111 nataila.s.riusech@nasa.gov / nilufar.ramji@nasa.gov Antonia Jaramillo Kennedy Space Center, Florida 321-501-8425 antonia.jaramillobotero@nasa.gov Share Details Last Updated Mar 02, 2025 LocationNASA Headquarters Related TermsCommercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS)ArtemisEarth's MoonScience & ResearchScience Mission Directorate View the full article

Curiosity Navigation Curiosity Home Mission Overview Where is Curiosity? Mission Updates Science Overview Instruments Highlights Exploration Goals News and Features Multimedia Curiosity Raw Images Images Videos Audio Mosaics More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions Mars Home 2 min read Smooshing for Science: A Flat-Out Success NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image using its SHERLOC WATSON camera, located on the turret at the end of the rover’s robotic arm. The view is looking down at a flattened pile of tailings created by the coring of science target “Green Gardens,” so named because it contains serpentine, a mineral often green in color. The rover’s SHERLOC instrument (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals) uses cameras, spectrometers, and a laser to search for organics and minerals that have been altered by watery environments and may be signs of past microbial life; in addition to its black-and-white context camera, SHERLOC is assisted by WATSON (Wide Angle Topographic Sensor for Operations and eNgineering), a color camera for taking close-up images of rock grains and surface textures. Perseverance acquired this image on Feb. 20, 2025 — sol 1424, or Martian day 1,424 of the Mars 2020 mission — at the local mean solar time of 13:11:41. This photo was selected by public vote and featured as “Image of the Week” for Week 210 (Feb. 16-22, 2025) of the Perseverance rover mission on Mars. NASA/JPL-Caltech Written by Henry Manelski, Ph.D. student at Purdue University The Perseverance team is always looking for creative ways to use the tools we have on Mars to maximize the science we do. On the arm of the rover sits the SHERLOC instrument, which specializes in detecting organic compounds and is crucial in our search for signs of past microbial life. But finding these organics isn’t easy. The uppermost surface of most rocks Perseverance finds on Mars have been exposed to ultraviolet rays from the sun and the long-term oxidative potential of the atmosphere, both of which have the potential to break down organic compounds. For this reason, obtaining SHERLOC measurements from a “fresh” rock face is ideal. Last week the rover cored a serpentine-rich rock aptly named “Green Gardens,” resulting in a fresh pile of drill tailings. To get this material ready for the SHERLOC instrument, which requires a smooth area to obtain a measurement, the science team did something for the first time on Mars: We smooshed it! Using the contact sensor of our sampling system, designed to indicate when our drill is touching a rock as it prepares to take a core, Perseverance pressed down into the tailings pile, compacting it into a flat, stable patch for SHERLOC to investigate. This unorthodox approach worked perfectly! The resulting SHERLOC spectral scan of these fresh tailings — which include serpentine, a mineral of key astrobiological interest — was a success. These flattened drill tailings are a great example of how a bit of out-of-the-box (or out-of-this-world!) thinking helps us maximize science on Mars. With this success behind us, the rover is rolling west toward the heart of “Witch Hazel Hill,” where more ancient rocks — and who knows what surprises — await! Share Details Last Updated Feb 28, 2025 Related Terms Blogs Explore More 4 min read Sols 4466-4468: Heading Into the Small Canyon Article 2 days ago 2 min read Sols 4464-4465: Making Good Progress Article 2 days ago 3 min read Sols 4461-4463: Salty Salton Sea? Article 3 days ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun, and the seventh largest. It’s the only planet we know of inhabited… All Mars Resources Explore this collection of Mars images, videos, resources, PDFs, and toolkits. Discover valuable content designed to inform, educate, and inspire,… Rover Basics Each robotic explorer sent to the Red Planet has its own unique capabilities driven by science. Many attributes of a… Mars Exploration: Science Goals The key to understanding the past, present or future potential for life on Mars can be found in NASA’s four… View the full article

3 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) The Compact Fire Infrared Radiance Spectral tracker, or C-FIRST, is managed an operated by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and supported by NASA’s Earth Science Technology Office. Combining state-of-the-art imaging technology with a compact design, C-FIRST enables scientists to gather data about fires and their impacts on ecosystems with greater accuracy and speed than other instruments. C-FIRST was developed as a spaceborne instrument, and flew onboard NASA’s B200 aircraft in January 2025 to conduct an airborne test.NASA/JPL-Caltech The January wildfires in California devastated local habitats and communities. In an effort to better understand wildfire behavior, NASA scientists and engineers tried to learn from the events by testing new technology. The new instrument, the Compact Fire Infrared Radiance Spectral Tracker (c-FIRST), was tested when NASA’s B200 King Air aircraft flew over the wildfires in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena, California. Based at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, the aircraft used the c-FIRST instrument to observe the impacts of the fires in near real-time. Due to its small size and ability to efficiently simulate a satellite-based mission, the B200 King Air is uniquely suited for testing c-FIRST. Managed and operated by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, c-FIRST gathers thermal infrared images in high-resolution and other data about the terrain to study the impacts of wildfires on ecology. In a single observation, c-FIRST can capture the full temperature range across a wide area of wildland fires – as well as the cool, unburned background – potentially increasing both the quantity and quality of science data produced. “Currently, no instrument is able to cover the entire range of attributes for fires present in the Earth system,” said Sarath Gunapala, principal investigator for c-FIRST at NASA JPL. “This leads to gaps in our understanding of how many fires occur, and of crucial characteristics like size and temperature.” For decades, the quality of infrared images has struggled to convey the nuances of high-temperature surfaces above 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit (550 degrees Celsius). Blurry resolution and light saturation of infrared images has inhibited scientists’ understanding of an extremely hot terrain, and thereby also inhibited wildfire research. Historically, images of extremely hot targets often lacked the detail scientists need to understand the range of a fire’s impacts on an ecosystem. NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, flew the B200 King Air in support of the Signals of Opportunity Synthetic Aperture Radar (SoOpSAR) campaign on Feb. 27, 2023.NASA/Steve Freeman To address this, NASA’s Earth Science Technology Office supported JPL’s development of the c-FIRST instrument, combining state-of-the-art imaging technology with a compact and efficient design. When c-FIRST was airborne, scientists could detect smoldering fires more accurately and quickly, while also gathering important information on active fires in near real-time. “These smoldering fires can flame up if the wind picks up again,” said Gunapala. “Therefore, the c-FIRST data set could provide very important information for firefighting agencies to fight fires more effectively.” For instance, c-FIRST data can help scientists estimate the likelihood of a fire spreading in a certain landscape, allowing officials to more effectively monitor smoldering fires and track how fires evolve. Furthermore, c-FIRST can collect detailed data that can enable scientists to understand how an ecosystem may recover from fire events. “The requirements of the c-FIRST instrument meet the flight profile of the King Air,” said KC Sujan, operations engineer for the B200 King Air. “The c-FIRST team wanted a quick integration, the flight speed in the range 130 and 140 knots on a level flight, communication and navigation systems, and the instruments power requirement that are perfectly fit for King Air’s capability.” By first testing the instrument onboard the B200 King Air, the c-FIRST team can evaluate its readiness for future satellite missions investigating wildfires. On a changing planet where wildfires are increasingly common, instruments like c-FIRST could provide data that can aid firefighting agencies to fight fires more effectively, and to understand the ecosystemic impacts of extreme weather events. Share Details Last Updated Feb 28, 2025 EditorDede DiniusContactErica HeimLocationArmstrong Flight Research Center Related TermsEarth ScienceAirborne ScienceArmstrong Flight Research CenterB200Earth Science Technology OfficeEarth's AtmosphereGeneralJet Propulsion Laboratory Explore More 1 min read Commodity Classic Hyperwall Schedule NASA Science at Commodity Classic Hyperwall Schedule, March 2-4, 2025 Join NASA in the Exhibit… Article 1 day ago 5 min read Fourth Launch of NASA Instruments Planned for Near Moon’s South Pole Article 2 days ago 3 min read NASA Names Stephen Koerner as Acting Director of Johnson Space Center Article 3 days ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center Earth Science Projects Division Aircraft Flown at Armstrong Science in the Air View the full article

Skywatching Science Skywatching What’s Up: March 2025… Skywatching Home What’s Up What to See Tonight Moon Guide Eclipses Meteor Showers More Tips & Guides Skywatching FAQ A Fast-Moving Planet and a Crimson Moon! Catch Mercury if you can, then stay up late for a total lunar eclipse, and learn the truth about the dark side of the Moon. Skywatching Highlights All Month – Planets Visibility: Mercury: Speedy Mercury is visible beneath Venus for the first week and a half of March, for about 30 minutes each evening, as sunset fades. Venus: Venus hangs low in the west after sunset early in the month, but quickly drops lower as the days pass. After mid-March, it’s difficult to observe in the glow of fading sunlight. Mars: Find Mars high in the east following sunset, then setting around 3 a.m. Jupiter: Visible high in the west after dark, and setting about 1 a.m. Daily Highlights: March 7-9 – Catch Mercury: Look for Mercury beginning about 30 minutes after sunset in the west, about 10 degrees above the horizon. March 13-14 – Total Lunar Eclipse: The Moon becomes a crimson orb over a couple of hours on March 13th and into the 14th, depending on your time zone. March 14 – Full moon March 29 – New moon: This is when the dark side of the Moon faces toward Earth. The new moon appears close to the Sun in the sky, so it’s essentially invisible from the surface (except during solar eclipses). Transcript What’s Up for March? A good time to catch Mercury, an eclipse approaches, and the dark side of the Moon. March Planet Viewing March begins with Venus still hanging out low in the west after sunset, but it quickly drops out of the sky – by mid-month it’s getting lost in the glare of sunset. Once it gets dark, you’ll find Jupiter and Mars high overhead, keeping you company through the evening. Mars sets a couple of hours after midnight this month, leaving the morning sky “planet free” for the first time in a year. Sky chart showing Venus and Mercury after sunset in early March. NASA/JPL-Caltech March also has the best opportunity this year for trying to spot fast-moving Mercury if you’re in the Northern Hemisphere. It’s only visible for a few weeks at a time every 3 to 4 months. This is because the speedy planet orbits the Sun in just 88 days, so it quickly shifts its position in the sky from day to day. It’s always visible either just after sunset or just before sunrise. On March 7th through 9th, look for Mercury beginning about 30 minutes after sunset in the west, about 10 degrees above the horizon. You’ll want to ensure your view isn’t blocked by trees, buildings, or other obstructions. Observing from a large, open field, or the shore of a lake or the seaside can be helpful. Spying Mercury isn’t always easy, but catching the fleet-footed planet is a worthy goal for any skywatcher. Total Lunar Eclipse This map shows where the Moon will be above the horizon during the March 13-14 total lunar eclipse. There’s a total lunar eclipse on the way this month, visible across the Americas. Lunar eclipses can be viewed from anywhere the Moon is above the horizon at the time. The show unfolds overnight on March 13th and into the 14th, depending on your time zone. Check the schedule for your area for precise timing. Now, during a total lunar eclipse, we watch as the Moon passes through Earth’s shadow. It first appears to have a bite taken out of one side, but as maximum eclipse nears, the Moon transforms into a deep crimson orb. That red color comes from the ring of all the sunsets and sunrises you’d see encircling our planet if you were an astronaut on the lunar surface right then. Afterward, the eclipse plays out in reverse, with the red color fading, and the dark bite shrinking, until the Moon looks like its usual self again. And here’s an interesting pattern: eclipses always arrive in pairs. A couple weeks before or after a total lunar eclipse, there’s always a solar eclipse. This time, it’s a partial solar eclipse that will be visible across Eastern Canada, Greenland, and Northern Europe. The Dark Side of the Moon The Moon has a dark side, but it may not be what you think. As it orbits around Earth each month, the Moon is also rotating (or spinning). So, while we always see the same face of the Moon, sunlight sweeps across the lunar surface every month as it rotates. This means there’s no permanently “dark” side. The Moon’s dark side faces Earth when the Moon passes between our planet and the Sun each month. This is the moment when the Moon is said to be “new,” as in a fresh start for its changing phases. The new moon is also located quite close the Sun in the sky, making it more or less invisible, unless there’s a solar eclipse. Nights around the new moon phase provide excellent opportunities for observing the sky – especially if you’re using a telescope or doing astrophotography. Without moonlight washing out the sky, you can better see faint stars, nebulas, the Milky Way, and distant galaxies. So next time someone mentions the “dark side of the Moon,” you’ll know there’s more to the story – and you might even discover some deep-sky treasures while the Moon takes its monthly break. The phases of the Moon for March 2025. NASA/JPL-Caltech Above are the phases of the Moon for March. Stay up to date on all of NASA’s missions exploring the solar system and beyond at NASA Science. I’m Preston Dyches from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and that’s What’s Up for this month. Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Skywatching Planets Solar System Exploration Moons View the full article

NASA An apprentice at Langley Laboratory (now NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia) inspects wind tunnel components in this image from May 15, 1943. During World War II, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), the precursor to NASA, employed apprentices (which NASA has since transitioned into internships) to support meaningful jobs in data computing, testing, and mechanical work. Make your own mark on NASA history. Apply to the agency’s summer internships by 11:59 p.m. EST Feb. 28. Image credit: NASA View the full article

Explore Hubble Hubble Home Overview About Hubble The History of Hubble Hubble Timeline Why Have a Telescope in Space? Hubble by the Numbers At the Museum FAQs Impact & Benefits Hubble’s Impact & Benefits Science Impacts Cultural Impact Technology Benefits Impact on Human Spaceflight Astro Community Impacts Science Hubble Science Science Themes Science Highlights Science Behind Discoveries Hubble’s Partners in Science Universe Uncovered Explore the Night Sky Observatory Hubble Observatory Hubble Design Mission Operations Missions to Hubble Hubble vs Webb Team Hubble Team Career Aspirations Hubble Astronauts News Hubble News Hubble News Archive Social Media Media Resources Multimedia Multimedia Images Videos Sonifications Podcasts e-Books Online Activities Lithographs Fact Sheets Posters Hubble on the NASA App Glossary More 35th Anniversary Online Activities 1 min read Hubble Captures New View of Colorful Veil This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image a supernova remnant called the Veil Nebula. ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Sankrit Download this image In this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image, Hubble once again lifts the veil on a famous — and frequently photographed — supernova remnant: the Veil Nebula. The remnant of a star roughly 20 times as massive as the Sun that exploded about 10,000 years ago, the Veil Nebula is situated about 2,400 light-years away in the constellation Cygnus. Hubble images of this photogenic nebula were first taken in 1994 and 1997, and again in 2015. This view combines images taken in three different filters by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3, highlighting emission from hydrogen, sulfur, and oxygen atoms. The image shows just a small fraction of the Veil Nebula; if you could see the entire nebula without the aid of a telescope, it would be as wide as six full Moons placed side-by-side. Although this image captures the Veil Nebula at a single point in time, it helps researchers understand how the supernova remnant evolves over decades. Combining this snapshot with Hubble observations from 1994 will reveal the motion of individual knots and filaments of gas over that span of time, enhancing our understanding of this stunning nebula. Facebook logo @NASAHubble @NASAHubble Instagram logo @NASAHubble Explore More The Death Throes of Stars Homing in on Cosmic Explosions Media Contact: Claire Andreoli (claire.andreoli@nasa.gov) NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD Share Details Last Updated Feb 28, 2025 Editor Andrea Gianopoulos Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms Hubble Space Telescope Astrophysics Astrophysics Division Goddard Space Flight Center Nebulae Supernova Remnants Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From Hubble Hubble Space Telescope Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe. Reshaping Our Cosmic View: Hubble Science Highlights Hubble’s Nebulae Hubble’s Night Sky Challenge View the full article

Project Manager – Goddard Space Flight Center Growing up near Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, Jamie Dunn — now a project manager for NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope — naturally became interested in planes. While he initially wanted to be a pilot, he chose aerospace engineering as a college major. “I originally had no plans to work in the space industry,” Jamie recalls. “I never imagined I’d be working at NASA.” While pursuing his degree at the University of Maryland, he heard about a cooperative education program at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. He applied, was accepted, and has been at Goddard ever since. Jamie Dunn serves as a project manager for NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. The observatory is currently taking shape in the largest clean room at the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., seen behind Jamie in this photo.NASA/Chris Gunn “I started out as a thermal vacuum test engineer, first focusing on smaller stuff and then I worked my way up to doing more complicated tests,” he says. “Before getting into the co-op program, I didn’t even know that job existed.” Jamie worked at Goddard mostly part-time while going to school and the role transitioned to a full-time job upon graduation. He continued working as a test engineer for several years and then became his group’s section head — his first supervisory role. From there, Jamie became the integration and testing manager for the Wide Field Camera 3, which was flown on Hubble Space Telescope Servicing Mission 4. That role teed him up for subsequent positions with the James Webb Space Telescope’s ISIM (Integrated Science Instrument Module) — first as the integration and testing manager, then deputy project manager, and ultimately the manager. Jamie Dunn, pictured at left, gives a tour to Nicola Fox (center), the associate administrator for science, and Wanda Peters (at right), the associate administrator for programs.NASA/Jolearra Tshiteya “The thirteen years I was on ISIM were like thirty,” Jamie says. “It was a very complex role involving international partnerships, contractors, and in-house personnel. We overcame a lot of adversity over the years in completing our work, and I learned a tremendous amount to be applied to my career going forward.” Following his time with Webb, Jamie spent a couple of years working on GOES-R (the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites–R Series), initially as deputy project manager and then project manager. “The biggest change was that GOES is out-of-house, so none of the hardware was developed at Goddard,” Jamie says. “That’s a huge difference.” In 2018, Jamie joined the Roman team in his current position of project manager. “In project management, you’re there to keep the train on the tracks and get to the station on time,” he says. “I focus heavily on programmatics, working closely with mission systems and project science, whose primary focus is on technical performance and science return. And when you have a healthy balance between them all like we do, it turns out to be a very successful endeavor.” A couple of years into the role, the COVID-19 pandemic struck. “It’s hard to put a spacecraft together when you’re not allowed to come to work,” Jamie says. “It was difficult because no one had experienced anything like it before, so everyone was trying to figure it out as we went along. We really focused on the team dynamic, being mindful of personal circumstances while aggressively pushing to resume onsite.” Now, the Roman mission is within a couple years of launch. Jamie’s looking forward to seeing all the engineering work translate into mind-boggling images of space. Roman will usher in a new era of cosmic surveys, discovering billions of cosmic objects at a rate never before seen in astrophysics. “When we launch this thing, that’ll definitely be the highlight of my career,” he says. “It’s really an honor to work with such a brilliant and dedicated team. For much of his time at NASA, Jamie has balanced running a project with running a household, taking care of three sons with his wife. “There’s a surprising amount of overlap between the two, because at the end of the day, it all comes down to people,” he says. “A lot of the job is psychological; having good working relationships across the team is crucial for success. To others who are interested in pursuing a similar career, Jamie recommends avoiding the “rush to the top.” He says, “I think it’s very important to make sure you spend time along the way to learn your craft. There’s no substitute for experience, and there are a lot of people to listen to and learn from along the way. Then you’ll be better prepared when you do land the job you’re ultimately aiming for.” By Ashley Balzer NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center View the full article

Explore This Section Earth Home Earth Observer Home Editor’s Corner Feature Articles Meeting Summaries News Science in the News Calendars In Memoriam More Archives 3 min read Commodity Classic Hyperwall Schedule NASA Science at AMS Hyperwall Schedule, January 13-16, 2025 Join NASA in the Exhibit Hall (Booth #401) for Hyperwall Storytelling by NASA experts. Full Hyperwall Agenda below. MONDAY, JANUARY 13 6:10 – 6:25 PM The Golden Age of Ocean Science: How NASA’s Newest Missions Advance the Study of Oceans in our Earth System Dr. Karen St. Germain 6:25 – 6:40 PM Integration of Vantage Points and Approaches for Earth System Science Dr. Jack Kaye 6:45 – 7:00 PM Helio Big Year Wind-Down and a Look Ahead Dr. Joseph Westlake 7:00 – 7:15 PM Chasing Snowstorms with Airplanes: An Overview of the IMPACTS Field Campaign John Yorks Lynn McMurdie 7:15 – 7:30 PM NASA Earth Action Empowering Health and Air Quality Communities Dr. John Haynes TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 10:00 – 10:15 AM Earthdata Applications Hannah Townley 10:15 – 10:30 AM Climate Adaptation Science Investigators (CASI): Enhancing Climate Resilience at NASA Cynthia Rosenzweig 10:30 – 10:45 AM From Orbit to Earth: Exploring the LEO Science Digest Jeremy Goldstein 12:00 – 12:15 PM Visualizaiton of the May 10-11 ‘Gannon’ Geospace Storm Michael Wiltberger 12:15 – 12:30 PM Explore Space Weather Through the Community Coordinated Modeling Center and OpenSpace Elana Resnick 12:30 – 12:45 PM Satellite Needs Working Group (SNWG): US Government Agencies’ Source of NASA ESD-wide Earth Observations solutions Natasha Sadoff 12:45 – 1:00 PM Connecting Satellite Data to the One Health Approach Helena Chapman 1:00 – 1:15 PM A Bird’s-Eye View of Pollution in Asian Megacities Laura Judd 1:15 – 1:30 PM Space Weather at Mars Gina DiBraccio Jamie Favors 3:00 – 3:15 PM Open Science: Creating a Culture of Innovation and Collaboration Lauren Perkins 3:15 – 3:30 PM NASA’s Early Career Reseach Program Paving the Way Cynthia Hall Yaítza Luna-Cruz 3:30 – 3:45 PM SciX: Accelerating Discovery of NASA’s Science through Open Science and Domain Integration Anna Kelbert 6:15 – 6:30 PM Using NASA IMERG to Detect Extreme Rainfall Within Data Deserts Owen Kelley George Huffman 6:30 – 6:45 PM Satellite Remote Sensing of Aerosols Around the World Rob Levy 6:45 – 7:00 PM The Sun, Space Weather, and You Jim Spann Erin Lynch 7:00 – 7:15 PM Eyes on the Stars: The Building of a 21st-century Solar Observatory Ame Fox Dr. Elsayed Talaat 7:15 – 7:30 PM NASA ESTO: Launchpad for Novel Earth Science Technologies Michael Seablom WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 15 10:00 – 10:15 AM Parker Solar Probe Outreach and the Power of Indigenous Thought Leaders Troy Cline 10:15 – 10:30 AM Forecasting Extreme Weather Events at Local Scales with NASA High-Resolution Models Gary Partyka 10:30 – 10:45 AM North American Land Data Assimilation System: Informing Water and Agricultural Management Applications with NASA Modeling and Remote Sensing Sujay Kumar 12:00 – 12:15 PM Life After Launch: A Snapshot of the First 9 Months of NASA’s PACE Mission Carina Poulin 12:15 – 12:30 PM Space Weather and the May 2024 Geomagnetic Storm Antti Pulkkinen 12:30 – 12:45 PM Geospace Dynamics Constellation: The Space Weather Rosetta Stone Dr. Katherine Garcia Gage 12:45 – 1:00 PM Monitoring Sea Level Change using ICESat-2 and other NASA EO Missions Aimee Neeley 1:00 – 1:15 PM Space Weather Center of Excellence CLEAR: All-CLEAR SEP Forecast Lulu Zhao 1:15 – 1:30 PM Harnessing the Power of NASA Earth Observations for a Resilient Water Future Stephanie Granger 3:00 – 3:15 PM From EARTHDATA to Action: Enabling Earth Science Data to Serve Society Jim O’Sullivan Yaitza Luna-Cruz 3:15 – 3:30 PM GMAO and GEOS Related Talk TBD Christine Bloecker 3:30 – 3:45 PM Live Heliophysics Kahoot! Quiz Bowl Jimmy Acevedo 3:45 – 4:00 PM Parker Solar Probe Nour Rawaf THURSDAY, JANUARY 16 10:00 – 10:15 AM Sounds of Space: Sonification with CDAWeb Alex Young 10:30 – 10:45 AM Developing the Future of Microwave Sounding Data: Benefits and Opportunities Ed Kim Share Details Last Updated Feb 27, 2025 Related Terms Earth Science View the full article

NASA/Brandon Torres Navarrete Engineers at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley, Bohdan Wesely, right, and Eli Hiss, left, complete a fit check of the two halves of a space capsule that will study the clouds of Venus for signs of life. Led by Rocket Lab of Long Beach, California, and their partners at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Rocket Lab’s Venus mission will be the first private mission to the planet. NASA’s role is to help the commercial space endeavor succeed by providing expertise in thermal protection of small spacecraft. Invented at Ames, NASA’s Heatshield for Extreme Entry Environment Technology (HEEET) – the brown, textured material covering the bottom of the capsule in this photo – is a woven heat shield designed to protect spacecraft from temperatures up to 4,500 degrees Fahrenheit. The probe will deploy from Rocket Lab’s Photon spacecraft bus, taking measurements as it descends through the planet’s atmosphere. Teams at Ames work with private companies, like Rocket Lab, to turn NASA materials into solutions such as the heat shield tailor-made for this spacecraft destined for Venus, supporting growth of the new space economy. NASA’s Small Spacecraft Technology program, part of the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, supported development of the heat shield for Rocket Lab’s Venus mission. View the full article

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