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By NASA
NASA/Charles Beason Students from the University of Massachusetts Amherst team carry their high-powered rocket toward the launch pad at NASA’s 2025 Student Launch launch day competition in Toney, Alabama, on April 4, 2025. More than 980 middle school, high school, and college students from across the nation launched more than 40 high-powered amateur rockets just north of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. This year marked the 25th anniversary of the competition.
To compete, students follow the NASA engineering design lifecycle by going through a series of reviews for nine months leading up to launch day. Each year, a payload challenge is issued to the university teams, and this year’s task focused on communication. Teams were required to have “reports” from STEMnauts, non-living objects inside their rocket, that had to relay real-time data to the student team’s mission control. This Artemis Student Challenge took inspiration from the agency’s Artemis missions, where NASA will send astronauts to explore the Moon for scientific discovery, economic benefit, and to build the foundation for the first crewed missions to Mars.
See highlights from the 2025 Student Launch.
Text credit: NASA/Janet Sudnik
Image credit: NASA/Charles Beason
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By NASA
3 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
When most people think of NASA, they picture rockets, astronauts, and the Moon. But behind the scenes, a group of inventors is quietly rewriting the rules of what’s possible — on Earth, in orbit, and beyond. Their groundbreaking inventions eventually become technology available for industry, helping to shape new products and services that improve life around the globe. For their contributions to NASA technology, we welcome four new inductees into the 2024-2025 NASA Inventors Hall of Fame
A robot for space and the workplace
Myron (Ron) Diftler led the team behind Robonaut 2 (R2), a humanoid robot developed with General Motors. The goal was to create a robot that could help humans both in space and on the factory floor. The R2 robot became the first humanoid robot in space aboard the International Space Station, and part of its technology was licensed for use on Earth, leading to a grip-strengthening robotic glove to help humans with strenuous, repetitive tasks. From factories to space exploration, Diftler’s work has real-world impact.
Some of the toughest electronic chips on and off Earth
Technology developed to one day explore the surface of Venus has to be tough enough to survive the planet where temperatures hit 860°F and the atmosphere is akin to battery acid. Philip Neudeck’s silicon carbide integrated circuits don’t just work — they ran for over 60 days in simulated Venus-like conditions. On Earth, these chips can boost efficiency in wireless communication systems, help make drilling for oil safer, and enable more practical electric vehicles.
From developing harder chip materials to unlocking new planetary missions, Neudeck is proving that the future of electronics isn’t just about speed — it’s about survival.
Hydrogen sensors that could go the distance on other worlds
Gary Hunter helped develop a hydrogen sensor so advanced it’s being considered for a future mission to Titan, Saturn’s icy moon. These and a range of other sensors he’s helped developed have applications that go beyond space exploration, such as factory floors here on Earth.
With new missions on the horizon and smarter sensors in development, Hunter is still pushing the boundaries of what NASA technology can do. Whether it’s Titan, the surface of Venus, or somewhere we haven’t dreamed of yet, this work could help shape the way to get there.
Advanced materials research to make travel safer
Advanced materials, such as foams and composites, are key to unlocking the next generation of manufacturing. From space exploration to industry, Erik Weiser spent years contributing his expertise to the development of polymers, ceramics, metals, nanomaterials, and more. He is named on more than 20 patents. During this time, he provided his foam expertise to the Space Shuttle Columbia accident investigation, the Shuttle Discovery Return-to-Flight Investigation and numerous teams geared toward improving the safety of the shuttle.
Today, Weiser serves as director of the Facilities and Real Estate Division at NASA Headquarters, overseeing the foundation of NASA’s missions. Whether it’s advancing research or optimizing real estate across the agency, he’s helping launch the future, one facility at a time.
Want to learn more about NASA’s game changing innovations? Visit the NASA Inventors Hall of Fame.
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Last Updated May 09, 2025 Related Terms
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By European Space Agency
Week in images: 05-09 May 2025
Discover our week through the lens
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By NASA
8 Min Read NASA Telescopes Tune Into a Black Hole Prelude, Fugue
The first sonification features WR124, an extremely bright, massive star. Here, the star is shown in a short-lived phase preceding the possible creation of a black hole. NASA released three new pieces of cosmic sound Thursday that are associated with the densest and darkest members of our universe: black holes. These scientific productions are sonifications — or translations into sound — of data collected by NASA telescopes in space including the Chandra X-ray Observatory, James Webb Space Telescope, and Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE).
This trio of sonifications represents different aspects of black holes and black hole evolution. WR124 is an extremely bright, short-lived massive star known as a Wolf-Rayet that may collapse into a black hole in the future. SS 433 is a binary, or double system, containing a star like our Sun in orbit with either a neutron star or a black hole. The galaxy Centaurus A has an enormous black hole in its center that is sending a booming jet across the entire length of the galaxy. Data from Chandra and other telescopes were translated through a process called “sonification” into sounds and notes. This new trio of sonifications represents different aspects of black holes. Black holes are neither static nor monolithic. They evolve over time, and are found in a range of sizes and environments.
WR 124
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Infrared: (Herschel) ESA/NASA/Caltech, (Spitzer) NASA/JPL/Caltech, (WISE) NASA/JPL/Caltech; Infrared: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Webb ERO Production Team; Image processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/J. Major; Sonification: NASA/CXC/SAO/K.Arcand, SYSTEM Sounds (M. Russo, A. Santaguida) The first movement is a prelude to the potential birth of a black hole. WR124 is an extremely bright, short-lived massive star known as a Wolf-Rayet at a distance of about 28,000 light-years from Earth. These stars fling their outer layers out into space, creating spectacular arrangements seen in an image in infrared light from the Webb telescope. In the sonification of WR124, this nebula is heard as flutes and the background stars as bells. At the center of WR124, where the scan begins before moving outward, is a hot core of the star that may explode as a supernova and potentially collapse and leave behind a black hole in its wake. As the scan moves from the center outward, X-ray sources detected by Chandra are translated into harp sounds. Data from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is heard as metallic bell-like sounds, while the light of the central star is mapped to produce the descending scream-like sound at the beginning. The piece is rounded out by strings playing additional data from the infrared telescopic trio of ESA’s (European Space Agency’s) Herschel Space Telescope, NASA’s retired Spitzer Space Telescope, and NASA’s retired Wide Image Survey Explorer (WISE) as chords.
SS 433
Credit: X-ray: (IXPE): NASA/MSFC/IXPE; (Chandra): NASA/CXC/SAO; (XMM): ESA/XMM-Newton; IR: NASA/JPL/Caltech/WISE; Radio: NRAO/AUI/NSF/VLA/B. Saxton. (IR/Radio image created with data from M. Goss, et al.); Image Processing/compositing: NASA/CXC/SAO/N. Wolk & K. Arcand; Sonification: NASA/CXC/SAO/K.Arcand, SYSTEM Sounds (M. Russo, A. Santaguida) In the second movement of this black hole composition, listeners can explore a duet. SS 433 is a binary, or double, system about 18,000 light-years away that sings out in X-rays. The two members of SS 433 include a star like our Sun in orbit around a much heavier partner, either a neutron star or a black hole. This orbital dance causes undulations in X-rays that Chandra, IXPE, and ESA’s XMM-Newton telescopes are tuned into. These X-ray notes have been combined with radio and infrared data to provide a backdrop for this celestial waltz. The nebula in radio waves resembles a drifting manatee, and the scan sweeps across from right to left. Light towards the top of the image is mapped to higher-pitch sound, with radio, infrared, and X-ray light mapped to low, medium, and high pitch ranges. Bright background stars are played as water-drop sounds, and the location of the binary system is heard as a plucked sound, pulsing to match the fluctuations due to the orbital dance.
Centarus A
Credit: X-ray: (Chandra) NASA/CXC/SAO, (IXPE) NASA/MSFC; Optical: ESO; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/K. Arcand, J. Major, and J. Schmidt; Sonification: NASA/CXC/SAO/K.Arcand, SYSTEM Sounds (M. Russo, A. Santaguida) The third and final movement of the black hole-themed sonifications crescendos with a distant galaxy known as Centaurus A, about 12 million light-years away from Earth. At the center of Centaurus A is an enormous black hole that is sending a booming jet across the entire length of the galaxy. Sweeping around clockwise from the top of the image, the scan encounters Chandra’s X-rays and plays them as single-note wind chimes. X-ray light from IXPE is heard as a continuous range of frequencies, producing a wind-like sound. Visible light data from the European Southern Observatory’s MPG telescope shows the galaxy’s stars that are mapped to string instruments including foreground and background objects as plucked strings.
For more NASA sonifications and information about the project, visit https://chandra.si.edu/sound/
These sonifications were led by the Chandra X-ray Center (CXC), with support from NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and NASA’s Universe of Learning program, which is part of the NASA Science Activation program. The collaboration was driven by visualization scientist Kimberly Arcand (CXC), astrophysicist Matt Russo, and musician Andrew Santaguida (both of the SYSTEM Sounds project), along with consultant Christine Malec.
NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, manages the Chandra program. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s Chandra X-ray Center controls science from Cambridge Massachusetts and flight operations from Burlington, Massachusetts. NASA’s Universe of Learning materials are based upon work supported by NASA under cooperative agreement award number NNX16AC65A to the Space Telescope Science Institute, working in partnership with Caltech/IPAC, Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
The agency’s IXPE is a collaboration between NASA and the Italian Space Agency with partners and science collaborators in 12 countries. The IXPE mission is led by Marshall. BAE Systems, Inc., headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, manages spacecraft operations together with the University of Colorado’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder.
To learn more about NASA’s space telescopes, visit:
https://science.nasa.gov/universe
Read more from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory Learn more about the Chandra X-ray Observatory and its mission here:
https://www.nasa.gov/chandra
https://chandra.si.edu
Visual Description
This release features three sonifications related to black holes, presented as soundtracks to short videos. Each sonification video features a composite image representing a different aspect of the life of a black hole. These images are visualizations of data collected by NASA telescopes. During each video, a line sweeps through the image. When the line encounters a visual element, it is translated into sound according to parameters established by visualization scientist Kimberly Arcand, astrophysicist Matt Russo, musician Andrew Santaguida, and consultant Christine Malec.
The first sonification features WR124, an extremely bright, massive star. Here, the star is shown in a short-lived phase preceding the possible creation of a black hole. At the center of the composite image is the large gleaming star in white and pale blue. The star sits at the heart of a mottled pink and gold cloud, its long diffraction spikes extending to the outer edges. Also residing in the cloud are other large gleaming stars, glowing hot-pink dots, and tiny specks of blue and white light. In this sonification, the sound activation line is an ever-expanding circle which starts in the center of the massive star and continues to grow until it exits the frame.
The second sonification features SS 433, a binary star system at the center of a supernova remnant known as the Manatee Nebula. Visually, the translucent, blobby teal nebula does, indeed, resemble a bulbous walrus or manatee, floating in a red haze packed with distant specs of light. Inside the nebula is a violet streak, a blue streak, and a large bright dot. The dot, represented by a plucking sound in the sonification, is the binary system at the heart of the nebula. In this sonification, the vertical activation line begins at our right edge of the frame, and sweeps across the image before exiting at our left.
The third and final sonification features Centaurus A, a distant galaxy with an enormous black hole emitting a long jet of high-energy particles. The black hole sits at the center of the composite image, represented by a brilliant white light. A dark, grainy, oblong cloud cuts diagonally across the black hole from our lower left toward our upper right. A large, faint, translucent blue cloud stretches from our upper left to our lower right. And the long, thin jet, also in translucent blue, extends from the black hole at the center toward the upper lefthand corner. In this sonification, the activation line rotates around the image like the hand of a clock. It begins at the twelve o’clock position, and sweeps clockwise around the image.
News Media Contact
Megan Watzke
Chandra X-ray Center
Cambridge, Mass.
617-496-7998
mwatzke@cfa.harvard.edu
Lane Figueroa
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama
256-544-0034
lane.e.figueroa@nasa.gov
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Last Updated May 08, 2025 EditorBeth RidgewayLocationMarshall Space Flight Center Related Terms
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By NASA
One half of NASA’s nearly complete Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope just passed a lengthy test to ensure it will function properly in the space environment. This milestone keeps Roman well on track for its target launch by May 2027, with the team aiming for as early as fall 2026.
This photo shows half of the NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman observatory — the outer barrel assembly, deployable aperture cover, and test solar arrays — fully deployed in a thermal chamber at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., for environmental testing. Credit: NASA/Sydney Rohde “This milestone tees us up to attach the flight solar array sun shield to the outer barrel assembly, and deployable aperture cover, which we’ll begin this month,” said Jack Marshall, who leads integration and testing for these elements at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “Then we’ll complete remaining environmental tests for the flight assembly before moving on to connect Roman’s two major assemblies and run the full observatory through testing, and then we’ll be ready to launch!”
Prior to this thermal testing, technicians integrated Roman’s deployable aperture cover, a visor-like sunshade, to the outer barrel assembly, which will house the telescope and instruments, in January, then added test solar panels in March. They moved this whole structure into the Space Environment Simulator test chamber at NASA Goddard in April.
There, it was subjected to the hot and cold temperatures it will experience in space. Next, technicians will join Roman’s flight solar panels to the outer barrel assembly and sunshade. Then the structure will undergo a suite of assessments, including a shake test to ensure it can withstand the vibrations experienced during launch.
This photo captures the installation of the test solar panels for NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, which took place in March. One panel is lifted in the center of the frame on its way to being attached to the outer barrel assembly at right. The deployable aperture cover is stowed on the front of the outer barrel assembly, and the other half of the observatory — the spacecraft and integrated payload assembly, which consists of the telescope, instrument carrier, and two instruments — appears at the left of the photo.Credit: NASA/Jolearra Tshiteya Meanwhile, Roman’s other major portion — the spacecraft and integrated payload assembly, which consists of the telescope, instrument carrier, and two instruments — will undergo its own shake test, along with additional assessments. Technicians will install the lower instrument sun shade and put this half of the observatory through a thermal vacuum test in the Space Environment Simulator.
“The test verifies the instruments will remain at stable operating temperatures even while the Sun bakes one side of the observatory and the other is exposed to freezing conditions — all in a vacuum, where heat doesn’t flow as readily as it does through air,” said Jeremy Perkins, an astrophysicist serving as Roman’s observatory integration and test scientist at NASA Goddard. Keeping the instrument temperatures stable ensures their readings will be precise and reliable.
Technicians are on track to connect Roman’s two major parts in November, resulting in a complete observatory by the end of the year. Following final tests, Roman is expected to ship to the launch site at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida for launch preparations in summer 2026. Roman remains on schedule for launch by May 2027, with the team aiming for launch as early as fall 2026.
This infographic shows the two major subsystems that make up NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. The subsystems are each undergoing testing prior to being joined together this fall.Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center To virtually tour an interactive version of the telescope, visit:
https://roman.gsfc.nasa.gov/interactive
The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is managed at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, with participation by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California; Caltech/IPAC in Pasadena, California; the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore; and a science team comprising scientists from various research institutions. The primary industrial partners are BAE Systems Inc. in Boulder, Colorado; L3Harris Technologies in Rochester, New York; and Teledyne Scientific & Imaging in Thousand Oaks, California.
By Ashley Balzer
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
Media Contact:
Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
301-286-1940
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Last Updated May 07, 2025 EditorAshley BalzerContactAshley Balzerashley.m.balzer@nasa.govLocationNASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms
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