NASA

2 min read Hubble Observes An Oddly Organized Satellite NASA, ESA, and E. Skillman (University of Minnesota – Twin Cities; Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America) Andromeda III is one of at least 13 dwarf satellite galaxies in orbit around the Andromeda galaxy, or Messier 31, the Milky Way’s closest grand spiral galactic neighbor. Andromeda III is a faint, spheroidal collection of old, reddish stars that appears devoid of new star formation and younger stars. In fact, Andromeda III seems to be only about 3 billion years younger than the majority of globular clusters ― dense knots of stars thought to have been mostly born at the same time, which contain some of the oldest stars known in the universe. Astronomers suspect that dwarf spheroidal galaxies may be leftovers of the kind of cosmic objects that were shredded and melded by gravitational interactions to build the halos of large galaxies. Curiously, studies have found that several of the Andromeda Galaxy’s dwarf galaxies, including Andromeda III, orbit in a flat plane around the galaxy, like the planets in our solar system orbit around the Sun. The alignment is puzzling because models of galaxy formation don’t show dwarf galaxies falling into such orderly formations, but rather moving around the galaxy randomly in all directions. As they slowly lose energy, the dwarf galaxies merge into the larger galaxy. The odd alignment could be because many of Andromeda’s dwarf galaxies fell into orbit around it as a single group, or because the dwarf galaxies are scraps left over from the merger of two larger galaxies. Either of these theories, which are being researched via NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, would complicate theories of galaxy formation but also help guide and refine future models. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope took this image of Andromeda III as part of an investigation into the star formation and chemical enrichment histories of a sample of M31 dwarf spheroidal galaxies that compared their first episodes of star formation to those of Milky Way satellite galaxies. Download Image Explore More Hubble’s Galaxies Facebook logo @NASAHubble @NASAHubble Instagram logo @NASAHubble Media Contact: Claire Andreoli NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD claire.andreoli@nasa.gov Share Details Last Updated Aug 29, 2024 Editor Michelle Belleville Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms Astrophysics Galaxies Goddard Space Flight Center Hubble Space Telescope Stars Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Hubble Space Telescope Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe. Hubble Science Hubble’s Galaxies Stars 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 More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions The Solar System The Sun Mercury Venus Earth The Moon Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune Pluto & Dwarf Planets Asteroids, Comets & Meteors The Kuiper Belt The Oort Cloud 4 min read Sols 4289-4290: From Discovery Pinnacle to Kings Canyon and Back Again This image shows the workspace in front of NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity, taken by the Left Navigation Camera aboard the rover on sol 4287 — Martian day 4,287 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission — on Aug. 28, 2024, at 02:23:27 UTC. NASA/JPL-Caltech Earth planning date: Wednesday, Aug. 28 2024 We are back … almost, anyways. Today’s parking location is very close to where we parked on sol 4253, and in an area near one of the previous contact science targets “Discovery Pinnacle.” You can read in this blog post that most of the team, this blogger included, was in Pasadena for our team meeting when we were last in this area. That was July and Curiosity was about to turn 12 on Mars. Coming back is a very rare occasion and is always planned carefully. Once or twice during the last 12 years it happened because we saw something “in the rear mirror.” One of the examples is the target “Old Soaker,” where we spotted mud cracks in the images from a previous parking position, and promptly went back because this was such an important discovery. At other times it was carefully planned, such as the “walkabout” at “Pink Cliffs,” which you can watch in this video from as long back as Earth year 2015. In the past few planning cycles, it’s more of the latter as we made our way from Discovery Pinnacle, where we were on sol 4253, “Just passing through” “Russell Pass” and arriving at “Kings Canyon,” our drill location, which we reached on sol 4257. You can follow all the action of the drilling at Kings Canyon on the blogs. It took a while — it always does — because it’s an activity with many steps and investigations to complete. We actually celebrated Curiosity’s 12th birthday at Kings Canyon! We departed on sol 4283, came back via “Cathedral Peak,” and are now near the Discovery Pinnacle location again. After that little walkabout through the history of (some) of Curiosity’s walkabouts, especially the very last one, let’s look at today’s plan. It is a pretty normal two-sol plan, with a one-hour science block before we drive away from this location. We were greeted by a nicely flat surface, and the engineers informed us that we have all six wheels firmly on flat and stable ground. That’s always a relief, because only then can we use the arm. That nice piece of flat rock Curiosity is so firmly parked on became our science target …well, mostly. Some of the little pebbles on the surface attracted our attention, too. The very eagle-eyed can spot a small white spot in the image above. It’s right between the arm and the rover itself, about where the C is written. That’s a rock that we likely broke up with our wheel and that has a very white part to it. We called it “Thousand Island Lake,” and will image it with MAHLI. APXS is investigating a target called “Eichorn Pinnacle,” squarely on the big flat area. LIBS is also making the most of the large target underneath and in front of us, investigating the target “Nine Lakes Basin.” In recent blogs you will have read about the dust-storm watch making the atmospheric investigations even more important, so we don’t miss any changes. We are looking for dust devils, atmospheric opacity, and are of course monitoring the weather throughout the plan. Our drive will hopefully — if Mars agrees — be a long one, and we will also plan an activity that we call MARDI sidewalk. That’s when we take very frequent pictures with the MARDI instrument while driving. This results in a long strip of images nicely showing the nature of the terrain the rover has driven over. This is in addition to the MARDI single frame we are taking every time the rover stops. I often get the question, why are we taking an image just downwards whenever the rover stops? Well, humans are easy to bias toward the outliers, toward the things that look special, and of course the Curiosity team is no exception. For some things this is great, because it allows for the discoveries of new things. But it doesn’t provide an unbiased overview. That’s what MARDI does: It always points down and reliably records the terrain under the rover. We don’t have to do anything but put the commands for that one image into our plan after the drive — something that’s pretty routine after 12 years now! Written by Susanne Schwenzer, Planetary Geologist at The Open University Share Details Last Updated Aug 29, 2024 Related Terms Blogs Explore More 3 min read Sols 4287-4288: Back on the Road Article 1 day ago 3 min read Perseverance Kicks off the Crater Rim Campaign! Perseverance is officially headed into a new phase of scientific investigation on the Jezero Crater… Article 2 days ago 4 min read Sols 4284–4286: Environmental Science Extravaganza 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

Home ASSURE 2016 has successfully concluded. UPDATES New! 2016-09-30: ASSURE 2016 concluded successfully. The accepted papers appear in the SAFECOMP 2016 Workshop Proceedings. Thank you for attending! See you in 2017. 2016-07-18: Clive Tomsett, Clinical Strategist at the Cerner Corporation, will give an invited keynote talk! 2016-07-18: The ASSURE 2016 Program has been announced. The final program is contingent on registration. If you haven’t already done so, please register for ASSURE 2016 via SAFECOMP 2016. 2016-06-08: ASSURE 2016 will be held on Tuesday, Sep. 20, 2016. The accepted papers and program will be posted here soon. 2016-06-07: Authors of accepted papers have been notified. The final, camera-ready version and a signed copyright release form are due on June 20, 2016. Instructions on submitting both the final version and the copyright form have been posted. 2016-05-26: Paper submission deadlines have passed. Submission is now closed. 2016-05-16: ASSURE deadlines have been extended by to May 26, 2016. Submit a paper now! 2016-03-28: The deadline to submit papers to ASSURE 2016 is May 17, 2016. 2016-03-28: The ASSURE 2016 call for papers, and the paper submission guidelines are now available. 2016-03-07: The ASSURE 2016 website is live! Introduction The 4th International Workshop on Assurance Cases for Software-intensive Systems (ASSURE 2016) is being collocated this year with SAFECOMP 2016, and aims to provide an international forum for high-quality contributions on the application of assurance case principles and techniques to provide assurance that the dependability properties of critical, software-intensive systems have been met. The main goals of the workshop are to: Explore techniques for the creation and assessment of assurance cases for software-intensive systems Examine the role of assurance cases in the engineering lifecycle of critical systems Identify the dimension of effective practice in the development and evaluation of assurance cases Investigate the relationship between dependability techniques and assurance cases Identify critical research challenges and define a roadmap for future development We invite original, high-quality research, practice, tools and position papers that have not been published/submitted elsewhere. See the full Call for Papers, for more details on topics. Also view the submission deadlines, and guidelines. Program 08:00 – 09:00 Registration 09:00 – 11:00 Session 1. Introduction, Keynote, and Lifecycles 09:00 – 09:10 Welcome and Introduction, ASSURE 2016 Organizers 09:10 – 10:00 Keynote Talk: Rhetoric or Rigor: The Development and Use of Safety Cases in Health IT Clive Tomsett, Cerner Corporation 10:00 – 10:30 The Agile Safety Case, Tor Stålhane and Thor Myklebust 10:30 – 11:00 Towards Faster Maintenance of Safety Cases, Omar Jaradat and Iain Bate 11:00 – 11:30 Morning Coffee/Tea Break 11:30 – 13:00 Session 2. Formal Evidence and Tool Support 11:30 – 12:00 On Using Results of Code­-level Bounded Model Checking in Assurance Cases, Carmen Cârlan, Daniel Ratiu, and Bernhard Schätz 12:00 – 12:30 Configuration­-aware Contracts, Irfan Šljivo, Barbara Gallina, Jan Carlson, and Hans Hansson 12:30 – 13:00 Developing SNS tool for Consensus Building on Environmental Safety using Assurance Cases, Yutaka Matsuno, Yang Ishigaki, Koichi Bando, Hiroyuki Kido, and Kenji Tanaka 13:00 – 14:00 Lunch Break 14:00 – 15:30 Session 3. Applications 14:00 – 14:30 The 6W1H Model as a Basis for Systems Assurance Argument, Shuji Kinoshita and Yoshiki Kinoshita 14:30 – 15:00 The Assurance Timeline: Building Assurance Cases for Synthetic Biology, Myra Cohen, Justin Firestone, and Massimiliano Pierobon 15:00 – 15:30 Towards Safety Case Integration with Hazard Analysis for Medical Devices, Andrzej Wardziński and Aleksander Jarzębowicz 15:30 – 16:00 Afternoon Coffee/Tea Break 16:00 – 17:30 Session 4. Panel and Conclusion 16:00 – 17:15 PANEL: Assurance Challenges for Safety-critical Autonomous Systems Panelists: – Håkon Olsen, Principal Consultant at Lloyd’s Register, Norway – Jérémie Guiochet, Professor at University of Toulouse, France – Marialena Vagia, Research Scientist at SINTEF, Norway – Ovidiu Drugan, Senior Researcher at DNV GL, Norway 17:15 – 17:30 Conclusion and Wrap-Up, ASSURE 2016 Organizers Important Dates Important Dates EVENTDEADLINEWorkshop Papers DueMay 26, 2016Notification of AcceptanceJune 7, 2016Camera-ready Copies DueJune 20, 2016ASSURE 2016 WorkshopSeptember 20, 2016SAFECOMP 2016September 20 – 23, 2016 ASSURE 2016 Call for Papers Software plays a key role in high-risk systems, e.g., safety-, and security-critical systems. Several certification standards/guidelines now recommend and/or mandate the development of assurance cases for software-intensive systems, e.g., defense (UK MoD DS-0056), aviation (CAP 760, FAA’s operational approval guidance for unmanned aircraft systems), automotive (ISO 26262), and healthcare (FDA infusion pumps total product lifecycle guidance). As such, there is a need to develop models, techniques and tools that target the development of assurance arguments for software. The goals of the 2016 Workshop on Assurance Cases for Software-intensive Systems (ASSURE 2016) are to: explore techniques for creating/assessing assurance cases for software-intensive systems; examine the role of assurance cases in the engineering lifecycle of critical systems; identify the dimensions of effective practice in the development and evaluation of assurance cases; investigate the relationship between dependability techniques and assurance cases; and, identify critical research challenges and define a roadmap for future development. We solicit high-quality contributions: research, practice, tools and position papers on the application of assurance case principles and techniques to assure that the dependability properties of critical software-intensive systems have been met. Papers should attempt to address the workshop goals in general. Topics Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: Assurance issues in emerging paradigms, e.g., adaptive and autonomous systems, including self-driving cars, unmanned aircraft systems, complex health care and decision making systems, etc. Standards: Industry guidelines and standards are increasingly requiring the development of assurance cases, e.g., the automotive standard ISO 26262 and the FDA guidance on the total product lifecycle for infusion pumps. Certification and Regulations: The role and usage of assurance cases in the certification of critical systems, as well as to show compliance to regulations. Dependable architectures: How do fault-tolerant architectures and design measures such as diversity and partitioning relate to assurance cases? Dependability analysis: What are the relationships between dependability analysis techniques and the assurance case paradigm? Tools: Using the output from software engineering tools (testing, formal verification, code generators) as evidence in assurance cases / using tools for the modeling, analysis and management of assurance cases. Application of formal techniques to create and analyze arguments. Exploration of relevant techniques for assurance cases for real-time, concurrent, and distributed systems. Modeling and Metamodeling: Representation of structured arguments through meta models, such as OMG’s Structured Assurance Case Metamodel (SACM). Assurance of software quality attributes, e.g., safety, security and maintainability, as well as dependability in general, including tradeoffs, and exploring notions of the quality of assurance cases themselves. Domain-specific assurance issues, in domains such as aerospace, automotive, healthcare, defense and power. Reuse and Modularization: Contracts and patterns for improving the reuse of assurance case structures. Connections between the Goal Structuring Notation for assurance cases, and goal-orientation from the requirements engineering community. Submit Submission Instructions for Accepted Papers If your paper has been accepted for the ASSURE 2016 Program, please follow the instructions below, when preparing your final, camera-ready paper for the proceedings. 1. Deadline The final paper and the signed copyright form are due on June 20, 2016. This is a firm deadline for the production of the proceedings. 2. Copyright Release Authors must fill and sign the Springer “Consent to Publish” copyright release form using the following information: Title of the Book or Conference Name: Computer Safety, Reliability, and Security – SAFECOMP 2016 Workshops – ASSURE, CYBERSUP, DECSoS, SASSUR, and TIPS Volume Editor(s): Amund Skavhaug, Jérémie Guiochet, Erwin Schoitsch, Friedemann Bitsch One author may sign on behalf of all authors. Springer does not accept digital signatures, unfortunately. Please physically sign the form, scan, and email it in PDF or any acceptable image format, to the SAFECOMP 2016 Publication Chair by the deadline above. Alternatively, upload the signed, and completed form via EasyChair using your author account. 3. Corresponding Authors Please nominate a corresponding author, whose name and email address must be included in the email containing the copyright release form. This author will be responsible for checking the pre-print proof of your paper prepared by Springer. 4. Pre-print Checking The publisher has recently introduced an extra control loop: once data processing is finished, they will contact all corresponding authors and ask them to check their papers. We expect this to happen shortly before the printing of the proceedings. At that time your quick interaction with Springer-Verlag will be greatly appreciated. 5. Formatting and Page Limits Please do not change the spacing and dimensions associated with the paper template files. Please ensure that your paper meets the page limits for your paper type. Regular research/practice papers: 12 pages including figures, references, and appendices. Tools papers: 10 pages, including figures, references, and appendices. Position papers: 4 – 6 pages including figures, references, and any appendices. 6. Final Paper Submission Submit your camera ready paper using your EasyChair author account, for inclusion into the Workshop Proceedings. After you have logged in, follow the “Proceedings” tab in the top panel. Springer reserves the right to reformat your paper to meet their print and digital publication requirements. Consequently, you will need to submit all the source files associated with your paper. Follow the instructions after the login for uploading two files: either a zipped file containing all your LaTeX sources or a Word file in the RTF format, and a PDF version of your camera-ready paper. Please strictly follow the LNCS paper formatting guidelines when preparing the final version. Committees Workshop Chairs Ewen Denney, SGT / NASA Ames, USA Ibrahim Habli, University of York, UK Ganesh Pai, SGT / NASA Ames, USA Program Committee (Login) Ersin Ancel, NASA Langley Research Center, USA Robin Bloomfield, City University, UK Reece Clothier, RMIT, Australia Martin Feather, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, USA Jérémie Guiochet, LAAS-CNRS, France Richard Hawkins, University of York, UK Tim Kelly, University of York, UK Yoshiki Kinoshita, Kanagawa University, Japan John Knight, University of Virginia, USA Helen Monkhouse, Protean Electric Ltd., UK Andrew Rae, Griffith University, Australia Roger Rivett, Jaguar Land Rover, UK John Rushby, SRI, USA Mark-Alexander Sujan, University of Warwick, UK Kenji Taguchi, AIST, Japan Alan Wassyng, McMaster University, Canada Sean White, Health and Social Care Information Centre, UK Previous ASSURE Workshops ASSURE 2015, Delft, The Netherlands ASSURE 2014, Naples, Italy ASSURE 2013, San Francisco, USA Contact Us If you have questions about paper topics, submission and/or about ASSURE 2016 in general, please contact the Workshop Organizers. 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Home ASSURE 2015 has successfully concluded. UPDATES 2015-10-05: ASSURE 2015 concluded successfully. The accepted papers appear in the SAFECOMP 2015 Workshop Proceedings. Thank you for attending! See you in 2016. 2015-06-24: Pippa Moore of the UK Civil Aviation Authority will give an invited keynote talk! 2015-06-24: The ASSURE 2015 Program has been announced. The final program is contingent on registration. If you haven’t already done so, please register for ASSURE 2015 via SAFECOMP 2015. 2015-06-15: ASSURE 2015 will be held on Tuesday, Sep. 22, 2015. The accepted papers and program will be posted here soon. 2015-06-15: Authors of accepted papers have been notified. Final, camera-ready copies and the copyright form are due on June 28, 2015 June 30, 2015. 2015-06-04: Paper submission deadlines have passed. Submission is now closed. 2015-05-28: SAFECOMP 2015 has extended all workshop deadlines, including for ASSURE 2015, by another week to June 3, 2015. 2015-05-19: ASSURE deadlines have been extended by a week to May 29, 2015. 2015-03-13: The ASSURE 2015 call for papers, and the paper submission guidelines are now available. 2015-03-12: The deadline to submit papers to ASSURE 2015 is May 22, 2015. 2015-03-05: The ASSURE 2015 website is live! Introduction ASSURE 2015, collocated this year with SAFECOMP 2015, aims to provide an international forum for high-quality contributions on the application of assurance case principles and techniques to assure that the dependability properties of critical, software-intensive systems have been met. The main goals of the workshop are to: Explore techniques for the creation and assessment of assurance cases for software-intensive systems Examine the role of assurance cases in the engineering lifecycle of critical systems Identify the dimension of effective practice in the development and evaluation of assurance cases Investigate the relationship between dependability techniques and assurance cases Identify critical research challenges and define a roadmap for future development We invite original, high-quality research, practice, tools and position papers that have not been published/submitted elsewhere. See the full Call for Papers, for more details on topics. Also view the submission deadline, and guidelines. Program 08:00 – 09:00 Registration 09:00 – 11:00 Session 1. Keynote and Foundations 09:00 – 09:10 Welcome and Introduction, ASSURE 2015 Organizers 09:10-10:00 Keynote Talk: Do We Really Want To Start From Here? Pippa Moore, UK Civil Aviation Authority 10:00-10:30 Informing Assurance Case Review through a Formal Interpretation of GSN Core Logic, Victor Bandur, and John McDermid 10:30 – 11:00 Representing Confidence in Assurance Case Evidence, Lian Duan, Sanjai Rayadurgam, Mats Heimdahl, Oleg Sokolsky, and Insup Lee 11:00 – 11:30 Morning Coffee/Tea Break 11:30-1:00 Session 2. Methodology and Patterns 11:30 – 12:00 Safe and Sec Case Patterns, Kenji Taguchi, Daisuke Souma, and Hideaki Nishihara 12:00 – 12:30 A Comprehensive Safety Lifecycle, John Knight, Jonathan Rowanhill, Anthony Aiello, and Kimberly Wasson 12:30 – 13:00 An Approach to Assure Dependability Through ArchiMate, Shuichiro Yamamoto 13:00 – 14:00 Lunch Break 14:00 – 15:30 Session 3. Tool Support and Tool Demonstrations 14:00 – 14:30 Tool Support for Assurance Case Building Blocks: Providing a Helping Hand with CAE, Kateryna Netkachova, Oleksandr Netkachov, and Robin Bloomfield 14:30 – 15:00 Safety.Lab: Model-based Domain Specific Tooling for Safety Argumentation, Daniel Ratiu, Marc Zeller, and Lennart Kilian 15:00 – 15:30 A Safety Condition Monitoring System, John Knight, Jonathan Rowanhill, and Jian Xiang 15:30 – 16:00 Afternoon Coffee/Tea Break 16:00 – 16:45 Session 4. Applications and Project Overviews 16:00 – 16:30 Fault Type Refinement for Assurance of Families of Platform-Based Systems, Sam Procter, John Hatcliff, Sandy Weininger, and Anura Fernando 16:30 – 16:37 Safety and Security Assurance in Railway Standards, Kenji Taguchi 16:37 – 16:45 Towards Assurance Arguments of Disaster Management Plans, Shuji Kinoshita 16:45 – 18:00 Session 5. Panel and Conclusion 16:45 – 18:00 PANEL: The Role of Argumentation in Certification and Safety Risk Management, John Birch, JaguarLandRover / AVL; Robin Bloomfield, Adelard and City University; Chris Johnson, University of Glasgow; Yoshiki Kinoshita, Kanagawa University; and Pippa Moore, UK CAA. 18:00 Conclusion and Wrap-Up, ASSURE 2015 Organizers Important Dates EventDeadlineWorkshop Papers DueJune 3, 2015 Now ClosedNotification of AcceptanceJune 15, 2015Camera-ready Copies DueJune 28, 2015 June 30, 2015ASSURE 2015 WorkshopSeptember 22, 2015SAFECOMP 2015September 22 – 25, 2015 Call For Papers Software plays a key role in high-risk systems, e.g., safety-, and security-critical systems. Several certification standards/guidelines now recommend and/or mandate the development of assurance cases for software-intensive systems, e.g., defense (UK MoD DS-0056), aviation (CAP 670. FAA operational approval guidance for unmanned aircraft systems), automotive (ISO 26262), and healthcare (FDA infusion pumps total product lifecycle guidance). As such, there is a need to develop models, techniques and tools that target the development of assurance arguments for software. The goals of the 2015 Workshop on Assurance Cases for Software-intensive Systems (ASSURE 2015) are to: explore techniques for creating/assessing assurance cases for software-intensive systems; examine the role of assurance cases in the engineering lifecycle of critical systems; identify the dimensions of effective practice in the development and evaluation of assurance cases; investigate the relationship between dependability techniques and assurance cases; and, identify critical research challenges and define a roadmap for future development. We solicit high-quality contributions: research, practice, tools and position papers on the application of assurance case principles and techniques to assure that the dependability properties of critical software-intensive systems have been met. Papers should attempt to address the workshop goals in general. Topics Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: Standards: Industry guidelines and standards are increasingly requiring the development of assurance cases, e.g., the automotive standard ISO 26262 and the FDA guidance on the total product lifecycle for infusion pumps. Certification and Regulations: The role and usage of assurance cases in the certification of critical systems, as well as to show compliance to regulations. Dependable architectures: How do fault-tolerant architectures and design measures such as diversity and partitioning relate to assurance cases? Dependability analysis: What are the relationships between dependability analysis techniques and the assurance case paradigm? Tools: Using the output from software engineering tools (testing, formal verification, code generators) as evidence in assurance cases / using tools for the modeling, analysis and management of assurance cases. Application of formal techniques to create and analyze arguments. Exploration of relevant techniques for assurance cases for real-time, concurrent, and distributed systems. Assurance issues in emerging computational paradigms, e.g., cloud, mobile, virtual, many-core architectures, and adaptive and autonomous systems. Modeling and Metamodeling: Representation of structured arguments through metamodels, such as OMG’s Structured Assurance Case Metamodel (SACM). Assurance of software quality attributes, e.g., safety, security and maintainability, as well as dependability in general, including tradeoffs, and exploring notions of the quality of assurance cases themselves. Domain-specific assurance issues, in domains such as aerospace, automotive, healthcare, defense and power. Reuse and Modularization: Contracts and patterns for improving the reuse of assurance case structures. Connections between the Goal Structuring Notation for assurance cases, and goal-orientation from the requirements engineering community. Submit Paper submission is now closed. Papers will be peer-reviewed by at least three members of the program committee. Accepted papers will be published in the SAFECOMP 2015 Workshop Proceedings, to be published by Springer, in the Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) Series. Authors of the best papers may be invited to submit an extended version for publication in a special journal issue (tentative). All papers must be original work not published, or in submission, elsewhere. All papers should be submitted only in PDF. Please verify that papers can be reliably printed and/or viewed on screen before submitting. Papers should conform to the LNCS paper formatting guidelines. Regular (research, practice, or position) papers can be up to 12 pages long including figures, references, and any appendices. Tools papers can be up to 10 pages long including figures, references and any appendices. Note: Authors of accepted tools papers will be expected to give a demonstration of the tool(s) at the workshop, i.e., no screenshots. Submit your paper electronically via EasyChair by May 22, 2015 May 29, 2015 June 3, 2015. Note: After logging into EasyChair, select New Submission . Then, be sure to select the track Assurance Cases for Software-intensive Systems to submit a paper to this workshop. Committees Workshop Chairs Ewen Denney, SGT / NASA Ames, USA Ibrahim Habli, University of York, UK Ganesh Pai, SGT / NASA Ames, USA Program Committee (Login) Robin Bloomfield, City University, UK Jérémie Guiochet, LAAS-CNRS, France Richard Hawkins, University of York, UK David Higham, Delphi Diesel Systems, UK Michael Holloway, NASA Langley Research Center, USA Paul Jones, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, USA Tim Kelly, University of York, UK Yoshiki Kinoshita, Kanagawa University, Japan John Knight, University of Virginia, USA Andrew Rae, Griffith University, Australia Roger Rivett, Jaguar Land Rover, UK Christel Seguin, ONERA, France Mark-Alexander Sujan, University of Warwick, UK Kenji Taguchi, AIST, Japan Alan Wassyng, McMaster University, Canada Sean White, Health and Social Care Information Centre, UK Past Workshop ASSURE 2013, San Francisco, USA ASSURE 2014, Naples, Italy Contact Us Contact the Organizers If you have questions about paper topics, submission and/or about ASSURE 2015 in general, please contact the Workshop Organizers. 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27 Min Read The Marshall Star for August 28, 2024 Marshall Leadership Updates Team Members on Culture, Strategy By Wayne Smith Leadership from NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center highlighted a successful summer before looking ahead to the center’s culture and strategy during an all-hands meeting Aug. 27 in Building 4316. Marshall Director Joseph Pelfrey recapped milestone events of the past few months, including new hardware for the Artemis II test flight. The launch vehicle stage adapter for the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket was rolled out Aug. 21 at Marshall and loaded on to the Pegasus barge. In July, the rocket’s core stage was shipped from NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility to the agency’s Kenney Space Center. The summer started with a NASA in the Park event in downtown Huntsville that attracted more than 14,000 people to learn more about Marshall’s work and is winding down with the continued celebration of the 25th anniversary of NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. NASA Marshall Space Flight Center Director Joseph Pelfrey, left, speaks to team members during the all-hands meeting Aug. 26 in Building 4316. Joining Pelfrey on stage, from left, are Rae Ann Meyer, deputy director; Roger Baird, associate director; and Larry Leopard, associate director, technical. NASA/Krisdon Manecke Pelfrey also commended Marshall’s Commercial Crew Program team members for their dedicated work and support of NASA’s Boeing Starliner Crew Flight Test to the International Space Station. “I just really appreciate the teams that worked so hard between NASA and Boeing to evaluate issues, and the ultimate decision was about safety,” Pelfrey said. “Those teams did a lot of tremendous work on analysis and testing to bring data to decision makers. Now we will get to move forward.” Before discussing Marshall’s culture and strategy, Pelfrey introduced three new members of Marshall’s leadership team: Davey Jones, center strategy lead; Denise Smithers, center executive officer; and Roger Baird, associate director. Pelfrey said leadership recognizes the vital roles culture and strategy play in the center’s ongoing success as Marshall makes a transformative shift to more strategic partnerships across NASA and with industry. He pointed to activities like NASA 2040 and More to Marshall as the center heads toward its 65th anniversary next summer. “Embracing a supportive work culture enhances collaboration, improves communication, and builds a sense of belonging and purpose,” Pelfrey said. “The center’s leadership team wants culture to come from all of us, so we continue to create opportunities for you to get involved, hear your feedback, and help shape the culture at Marshall.” Rae Ann Meyer, the center’s deputy director, provided updates on Marshall’s culture initiatives. She invited team members to participate in a survey on the most important attributes for a thriving center, following up on feedback from last August. Meyer said leadership wants continued input from team members and applauded Marshall’s highest ever participation (85.1%) in the 2024 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey. Marshall team members listen as Meyer, on stage at left, talks about the center’s culture initiatives.NASA/Krisdon Manecke “Regardless of role, each team member plays a vital part in shaping the culture that makes NASA and Marshall an extraordinary place to work and achieve great things,” Meyer said. “Creating a positive culture is a long-term process that requires time and sustained effort – it does not happen overnight.” In his remarks, Jones also encouraged feedback and participation from team members. He said center culture and strategy “need to be attached at the hip.” “Part of that success is making sure communication is open between center strategy and culture and to the workforce because it not only encourages collaboration, but also fosters transparency, which is one of the key cultural attributes discussed today,” Jones said. Leadership took questions from team members to close out the session, before wrapping up with a More to Marshall video. “This year, you have heard a lot about More to Marshall, and it is more than a slogan; it really symbolizes the initiative we have to prepare our center for the future and take advantage of all the expertise we have at the center and all our capabilities,” Pelfrey said. “It’s an approach that reinforces our center strategy that’s going to enable our future role in space exploration.” Smith, a Media Fusion employee and the Marshall Star editor, supports the Marshall Office of Communications. › Back to Top NASA Moves Artemis II Rocket Adapter to Pegasus Barge for Shipment NASA rolled out a key piece of space flight hardware for the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket for the first crewed mission of NASA’s Artemis campaign from Marshall Space Flight Center on Aug. 21 for shipment to the agency’s Kennedy Space Center. The cone-shaped launch vehicle stage adapter connects the rocket’s core stage to the upper stage and helps protect the upper stage’s engine that will help propel the Artemis II test flight around the Moon, slated for 2025. Crews moved the cone-shaped launch vehicle stage adapter out of Building 4708 at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center to the agency’s Pegasus barge on Aug. 21. The barge will ferry the adapter first to NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility, where it will pick up additional SLS hardware for future Artemis missions, and then travel to the agency’s Kennedy Space Center. In Florida, teams with NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems will prepare the adapter for stacking and launch.NASA/Brandon Hancock “The launch vehicle stage adapter is the largest SLS component for Artemis II that is made at the center,” said Chris Calfee, SLS Spacecraft Payload Integration and Evolution element manager. “Both the adapters for the SLS rocket that will power the Artemis II and Artemis III missions are fully produced at NASA Marshall. Alabama plays a key role in returning astronauts to the Moon.” A NASA team member watches as the launch vehicle stage adapter is transported toward the Pegasus bargeNASA/Brandon Hancock Crews moved the adapter out of Marshall’s Building 4708 to the agency’s Pegasus barge Aug. 21. The barge will ferry the adapter first to NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility, where crews will pick up additional SLS hardware for future Artemis missions, before traveling to Kennedy. Once in Florida, the adapter will join the recently delivered core stage. There, teams with NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems will prepare the adapter for stacking and launch. The launch vehicle stage adapter moves to the Pegasus barge on the Tennessee River. The cone-shaped adapter connects the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket’s core stage to the upper stage and helps protect the upper stage’s engine that will help propel the Artemis II test flight around the Moon, slated for 2025.NASA/Michael DeMocker Engineering teams at Marshall are in the final phase of integration work on the launch vehicle stage adapter for Artemis III. The stage adapter is manufactured by prime contractor Teledyne Brown Engineering and the Jacobs Space Exploration Group’s ESSCA (Engineering Services and Science Capability Augmentation) contract using NASA Marshall’s self-reacting friction-stir robotic and vertical weld tools. A look at the launch vehicle stage adapter inside the Pegasus barge.NASA/Sam Lott Through the Artemis campaign, NASA will land the first woman, first person of color, and its first international partner astronaut on the Moon. The rocket is part of NASA’s deep space exploration plans, along with the Orion spacecraft, supporting ground systems, advanced spacesuits and rovers, Gateway in orbit around the Moon, and commercial human landing systems. NASA’s SLS is the only rocket that can send Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single launch. The Pegasus barge moves underneath the Tennessee River bridge in Decatur as it heads for its first stop at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility before moving on to the agency’s Kennedy Space Center.NASA/Brandon Hancock The first piece of hardware manufactured at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center for NASA’s SLS (Space Launch System) rocket that will launch a crewed Artemis mission was moved for shipment Aug. 21. Crews guided the launch vehicle stage adapter from Building 4708 to the agency’s Pegasus barge. Fully produced at Marshall, the adapter is traveling to NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility, where Pegasus will pick up additional SLS rocket hardware for future Artemis missions, before traveling to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. Once in Florida, the adapter will join the recently delivered core stage for Artemis II. The adapter plays a critical role as it connects the Moon rocket’s core stage to the upper stage and helps protect the upper stage’s engine that will help propel the Artemis II test flight and a crew of four astronauts around the Moon, slated for 2025. (NASA) › Back to Top Cassiopeia A,Thenthe Cosmos: 25 Years of Chandra X-ray Science By Rick Smith On Aug. 26, 1999, NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory opened its powerful telescopic eye in orbit and captured its awe-inspiring “first light” images of Cassiopeia A, a supernova remnant roughly 11,000 light-years from Earth. That first observation was far more detailed than anything seen by previous X-ray telescopes, even revealing – for the first time ever – a neutron star left in the wake of the colossal stellar detonation. NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has observed Cassiopeia A for more than 2 million total seconds since its “first light” images of the supernova remnant on Aug. 26, 1999. Cas A is some 11,000 light-years from Earth. Chandra X-rays are depicted in blue and composited with infrared images from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope in orange and white.X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Infrared: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/D. Milisavljevic (Purdue Univ.), I. De Looze (University of Ghent), T. Temim (Princeton Univ.); Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/J. Schmidt, K. Arcand, and J. Major Those revelations came as no surprise to Chandra project scientist Martin Weisskopf, who led Chandra’s development at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. “When you build instrumentation that’s 10 times more sensitive than anything that was done before, you’re bound to discover something new and exciting,” he said. “Every step forward was a giant step forward.” Twenty-five years later, Chandra has repeated that seminal moment of discovery again and again, delivering – to date – nearly 25,000 detailed observations of neutron stars, quasars, supernova remnants, black holes, galaxy clusters, and other highly energetic objects and events, some as far away as 13 billion light-years from Earth. Chandra has further helped scientists gain tangible evidence of dark matter and dark energy, documented the first electromagnetic events tied to gravitational waves in space, and most recently aided the search for habitable exoplanets – all vital tools for understanding the vast, interrelated mechanisms of the universe we live in. “Chandra’s first image of Cas A provided stunning demonstration of Chandra’s exquisite X-ray mirrors, but it simultaneously revealed things we had not known about young supernova remnants,” said Pat Slane, director of the CXC (Chandra X-ray Center) housed at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “In a blink, Chandra not only revealed the neutron star in Cas A; it also taught us that young neutron stars can be significantly more modest in their output than what previously had been understood. Throughout its 25 years in space, Chandra has deepened our understanding of fundamental astrophysics, while also greatly broadening our view of the universe.” To mark Chandra’s silver anniversary, NASA and CXC have shared 25 of its most breathtaking images and debuted a new video, “Eye on the Cosmos.” Chandra often is used in conjunction with other space telescopes that observe the cosmos in different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, and with other high-energy missions such as ESA’s (European Space Agency’s) XMM-Newton; NASA’s Swift, NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array), and IXPE (Imaging X-ray Polarization Explorer) imagers, and NASA’s NICER (Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer) X-ray observatory, which studies high-energy phenomena from its vantage point aboard the International Space Station. These images were released to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Chandra. They represent the wide range of objects that the telescope has observed over its quarter century of observations. X-rays are an especially penetrating type of light that reveals extremely hot objects and very energetic physical processes. The images range from supernova remnants, like Cassiopeia A, to star-formation regions like the Orion Nebula, to the region at the center of the Milky Way. This montage also contains objects beyond our own Galaxy including other galaxies and galaxy clusters.X-ray: NASA/CXC/UMass/Q.D. Wang; Image processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/N. Wolk Chandra remains a unique, global science resource, with a robust data archive that will continue to serve the science community for many years. “NASA’s project science team has always strived to conduct Chandra science as equitably as possible by having the world science community collectively decide how best to use the observatory’s many tremendous capabilities,” said Douglas Swartz, a USRA (Universities Space Research Association) principal research scientist on the Chandra project science team. “Chandra will continue to serve the astrophysics community long after its mission ends,” said Andrew Schnell, acting Chandra program manager at Marshall. “Perhaps its greatest discovery hasn’t been discovered yet. It’s just sitting there in our data archive, waiting for someone to ask the right question and use the data to answer it. It could be somebody who hasn’t even been born yet.” That archive is impressive indeed. To date, Chandra has delivered more than 70 trillion bytes of raw data. More than 5,000 unique principal investigators and some 3,500 undergraduate and graduate students around the world have conducted research based on Chandra’s observations. Its findings have helped earn more than 700 PhDs and resulted in more than 11,000 published papers, with half a million total citations. NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory data, seen here in violet and white, is joined with that of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope (red, green, and blue) and Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (purple) to show off the eerie beauty of the Crab Nebula. The nebula is the result of a bright supernova explosion first witnessed and documented in 1054 A.D.X-ray: (Chandra) NASA/CXC/SAO, (IXPE) NASA/MSFC; Optical: NASA/ESA/STScI; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/J. Schmidt, K. Arcand, and L. Frattare Weisskopf is now an emeritus researcher who still keeps office hours every weekday despite having retired from NASA in 2022. He said the work remains as stimulating now as it was 25 years ago, waiting breathlessly for those “first light” images. “We’re always trying to put ourselves out of business with the next bit of scientific understanding,” he said. “But these amazing discoveries have demonstrated how much NASA’s astrophysics missions still have to teach us.” The universe keeps turning – and Chandra’s watchful eye endures. Chandra, managed for NASA by Marshall in partnership with the CXC, is one of NASA’s Great Observatories, along with the Hubble Space Telescope and the now-retired Spitzer Space Telescope and Compton Gamma Ray Observatory. It was first proposed to NASA in 1976 by Riccardo Giacconi, recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize for Physics based on his contributions to X-ray astronomy, and Harvey Tananbaum, who would later become the first director of the Chandra X-ray Center. Chandra was named in honor of the late Nobel laureate Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, who earned the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1983 for his work explaining the structure and evolution of stars. Smith, an Aeyon/MTS employee, supports the Marshall Office of Communications. › Back to Top The Legacy Continues: Space & Rocket Center Event Highlights Chandra’s 25th Anniversary NASA Marshall Space Flight Center Director Joseph Pelfrey, bottom center, second from left, welcomes Huntsville community members to an event celebrating 25 years of the agency’s Chandra X-ray Observatory at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center’s Intuitive Planetarium on Aug. 23. Pelfrey introduced the evening’s panelists, which included, from left, former NASA astronaut Eileen Collins, Marshall research astrophysicist Jessica Gaskin, and Chandra deputy project scientist Steven Ehlert. Pelfrey also introduced the premier showing of a video marking Chandra’s 25th anniversary. (NASA/Taylor Goodwin) The program was hosted by David Weigel, bottom right, director of the U.S. Space & Rocket Center’s Intuitive Planetarium. Former NASA astronaut Cady Coleman, top right, joined the panel virtually to share her experience as a mission specialist on STS-93, which deployed the iconic space telescope. Collins joined STS-93 as the first woman to command a space shuttle mission. Together, the two former astronauts gave first-hand accounts of their journey aboard space shuttle Columbia. (NASA/Taylor Goodwin) Collins shared her enthusiasm for space exploration and the importance of Chandra’s scientific contributions to attendees of all ages throughout the event. (NASA/Taylor Goodwin) › Back to Top Take 5 with April Hargrave By Wayne Smith April Hargrave’s father was an educator who encouraged her from an early age to believe she could be whatever she wanted to be. She followed her father’s guidance. April Hargrave is the manager of Program, Planning, and Control (PP&C) in the Human Exploration Development and Operations (HP/HEDO) Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.Photo courtesy of Jenna Hassell Today, Hargrave is the manager of Program, Planning, and Control (PP&C) in the Human Exploration Development and Operations (HP/HEDO) Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. Hargrave credits her parents for inspiring her to seek a career that eventually led to Marshall, where she has been for 15 years. Hargrave’s father – G.W. Braidfoot – was a high school educator in Lawrence County, Alabama, for 28 years. He taught history and civics, before moving into roles as an administrator and guidance counselor, focusing on guiding his students toward their post-high school goals. “What has always stood out to me is my parents never placed boundaries on my passions and career choices,” said Hargrave, a North Alabama native who lives in Athens. “Reflecting back, that is something of which I am very appreciative. In the absence of boundaries, it has allowed me to push myself in my pursuits and shaped my career path, which included high school STEM courses and college career choices. Those college choices were pursuing a bachelor’s degree in chemistry at the University of North Alabama in Florence, and later another degree in chemical engineering at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. As PP&C manager for HEDO’s diverse and complex portfolio of programs, projects, and other activities, Hargrave provides tools and resources to HP management that enables strategic decision making and workforce planning. “My background and experiences helped shaped my early career in industry and established a strong foundation and relationships, which led me to Marshall mid-career,” she said. “At Marshall, I’m thankful to have had mentors and encouragers who have led me to my current leadership role – people who believed in me and allowed me an opportunity. For that, I will forever be grateful.” Question: What excites you most about the future of human space exploration, or your NASA work, and your team’s role it? Hargrave: What excites me the most are the advancements we are making in human health and exploration. I’ve had close relatives suffer from diseases, such as Alzheimer’s and heart disease. I hope to see in the near future outcomes of human research on the International Space Station and the Moon that leads to medical and technology advancements, resulting in slowing the progression and eventually eliminating these diseases. Our HP PP&C team enables our missions by providing planning, integration, and support across our organization. Question: What has been the proudest moment of your career and why? Hargrave: Being able to mentor others throughout my career and watching them achieve success. Being in a position to recognize potential in others and encourage them to stretch and take risks in their careers, I find it very rewarding, especially after they have moved on that I’m able to still observe the growth and development they’ve experienced and to know I made a contribution. Question: Who or what drives/motivates you? Hargrave: My team drives me – I have a wonderful team that motivates me to be the best version of myself I can be. My team is comprised of a diverse group of personnel whose jobs are not always connected. However, we are still able to promote a great teaming environment where we encourage and leverage off each other’s skills and knowledge bases. My team is dedicated to doing the best job possible which motivates me daily in the excellent support they provide across HP. It allows me opportunities to lead by example and recognize their successes. It also allows me to look across the team and how to use them best based on their strengths. Question: What advice do you have for employees early in their NASA career or those in new leadership roles? Hargrave: It is important to learn what the NASA mission is and don’t be afraid to ask questions. Learn about the work that you are doing and how it impacts the mission as a whole. As you learn and understand the work within your role, develop a passion for the work. Take opportunities to understand the big picture and learn what others are doing across the center. Don’t be afraid to take lateral opportunities to allow you to gain new experiences and broaden your knowledge base. And if you find yourself in a leadership role, never lose sight that it’s the people behind that work that’s most important. Take the time to build and nurture those relationships because at the end of the day, our workforce is what makes us successful. Question: What do you enjoy doing with your time while away from work? Hargrave: My joy is helping and supporting others. Being part of a large family (raised one of five children and an even larger extended family), there’s naturally always plenty to do and lots of family to help and encourage. Much of my recent years have been spent cheering on my sons, nieces, and nephews. I also enjoy serving in my church and helping organize events to celebrate our family and friends. Smith, a Media Fusion employee and the Marshall Star editor, supports the Marshall Office of Communications. › Back to Top Over the Moon: Photographer Captures Supermoon Rising Near Marshall By Wayne Smith Once in a Blue Moon wasn’t enough for Michael DeMocker, a photographer for NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility. Nearly one year after capturing a spectacular image of a super Blue Moon rising over the Crescent City Connection Bridge in New Orleans, DeMocker found another opportunity to focus his camera on the lunar landscape while visiting the Rocket City. The result was another stunning photograph, this one of the Moon rising Aug. 19 behind the Saturn V rocket at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center A super Blue Moon rises Aug. 19 over Huntsville, home to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and the U.S. Space and Rocket Center. The full Moon was both a supermoon and a Blue Moon. As the Moon reaches its closest approach to Earth, the Moon looks larger in the night sky with supermoons becoming the biggest and brightest full Moons of the year. While not blue in color, the third full Moon in a season with four full Moons is called a Blue Moon.NASA/Michael DeMocker And you can say the image DeMocker captured left him, well, over the Moon. He explains how he got the photo. “NASA photographer Eric Bordelon and I drove up from Michoud to Marshall to provide drone support for the move of the launch vehicle stage adapter of the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket to NASA’s Pegasus barge on Aug. 21,” DeMocker said. “On the trip up, we talked about possibly capturing the super Blue Moon rising that night. Using an app that shows the direction of the moonrise overlayed with a satellite image of the area, we couldn’t find a definitive spot where we thought we could get a clean line of the Moon rising with some kind of iconic Huntsville landmark. So, like good New Orleanians, we put off thinking about it until after eating. As we approached the restaurant, we caught glimpses of the Saturn V rocket at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center. We realized if we got on the roof of a nearby parking garage, we would have a clean view of the Moon rising somewhat behind it. “The angle wasn’t perfect; I’d have preferred to be more to the right but that would have sent me plummeting off the parking garage. The clouds cooperated, the Moon rose bright and beautiful, and I got images I was happy with while Eric got a very cool time-lapse video of the Moon and the rocket.” So, of the two Blue Moon images, which is DeMocker’s favorite? “Yikes, that’s like choosing a child!” DeMocker said. “My favorite pictures are not always the best ones, but the ones that I didn’t think I would be able to pull off. So, while the Moon over the bridge I think is an overall better photo, it was pretty easy to plan and didn’t require much resourcefulness, so I like the rocket one better.” DeMocker, a past Pulitzer Prize winner for team coverage of Hurricane Katrina, was honored this year with third-place finishes in two categories in NASA’s Photographer of the Year competition. He also was part of a Michoud team that captured a first-place award in the agency’s Videographer of the Year competition. “But my favorite photos I’ve ever shot in my career have never won awards,” DeMocker said. “I like them because I thought they would be almost impossible to get when I set out after them: a drone shot of an erupting volcano in Iceland, an Iraqi woman voting in Baghdad, or my toddler quietly looking at art in the Louvre.” Smith, a Media Fusion employee and the Marshall Star editor, supports the Marshall Office of Communications. › Back to Top NASA, Boeing Optimizing Vehicle Assembly Building High Bay for Future SLS Stage Production NASA is preparing space at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center for upcoming assembly activities of the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket core stage for future Artemis missions, beginning with Artemis III. Teams are currently outfitting the assembly building’s High Bay 2 for future vertical assembly of the rocket stage that will help power NASA’s Artemis campaign to the Moon. During Apollo, High Bay 2, one of four high bays inside the Vehicle Assembly Building, was used to stack the Saturn V rocket. During the Space Shuttle Program, the high bay was used for external tank checkout and storage and as a contingency storage area for the shuttle. Technicians are building tooling in High Bay 2 at NASA Kennedy that will allow NASA and Boeing, the SLS core stage lead contractor, to vertically integrate the core stage.NASA Michigan-based Futuramic is constructing the tooling that will hold the core stage in a vertical position, allowing NASA and Boeing, the SLS core stage lead contractor, to integrate the SLS rocket’s engine section and four RS-25 engines to finish assembly of the rocket stage. Vertical integration will streamline final production efforts, offering technicians 360-degree access to the stage both internally and externally. “The High Bay 2 area at NASA Kennedy is critical for work as SLS transitions from a developmental to operational model,” said Chad Bryant, deputy manager of the SLS Stages Office. “While teams are stacking and preparing the SLS rocket for launch of one Artemis mission, the SLS core stage for another Artemis mission will be taking shape just across the aisleway.” Under the new assembly model beginning with Artemis III, all the major structures for the SLS core stage will continue to be fully produced and manufactured at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility. Upon completion of manufacturing and thermal protection system application, the engine section will be shipped to NASA Kennedy for final outfitting. Later, the top sections of the core stage – the forward skirt, intertank, liquid oxygen tank, and liquid hydrogen tank – will be outfitted and joined at Michoud and shipped to Kennedy for final assembly. The fully assembled core stage for Artemis II arrived at Kennedy on July 23. NASA’s Pegasus barge delivered the SLS engine section for Artemis III to Kennedy in December 2022. Teams at Michoud are outfitting the remaining core stage elements and preparing to horizontally join them. The four RS-25 engines for the Artemis III mission are complete at NASA’s Stennis Space Center and will be transported to Kennedy in 2025. Major core stage and exploration upper stage structures are in work at Michoud for Artemis IV and beyond. NASA is working to land the first woman, first person of color, and its first international partner astronaut on the Moon under Artemis. SLS is part of NASA’s backbone for deep space exploration, along with the Orion spacecraft, supporting ground systems, advanced spacesuits and rovers, the Gateway in orbit around the Moon, and commercial human landing systems. SLS is the only rocket that can send Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single launch. NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center manages the SLS Program and Michoud. › Back to Top How Students Learn to Fly NASA’s IXPE Spacecraft The large wall monitor displaying a countdown shows 17 seconds when Amelia “Mia” De Herrera-Schnering tells her teammates “We have AOS,” meaning “acquisition of signal.” “Copy that, thank you,” Alexander Pichler replies. The two are now in contact with NASA’s IXPE (Imaging X-Ray Polarimeter Explorer) spacecraft, transmitting science data from IXPE to a ground station and making sure the download goes smoothly. That data will then go to the science team for further analysis. Amelia “Mia” De Herrera-Schnering is an undergraduate student at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and command controller for NASA’s IXPE mission at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP). NASA/Elizabeth Landau At LASP, the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, students at the University of Colorado, Boulder, can train to become command controllers, working directly with spacecraft on pointing the satellites, calibrating instruments, and collecting data. De Herrera-Schnering recently completed her sophomore year, while Pichler had trained as a student and now, having graduated, works as a full-time professional at LASP. “The students are a key part in what we do,” said Stephanie Ruswick, IXPE flight director at LASP. “We professionals monitor the health and safety of the spacecraft, but so do the students, and they do a lot of analysis for us.” Students also put into motion IXPE’s instrument activity plans, which are provided by the Science Operations Center at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. The LASP student team schedules contacts with ground stations to downlink data, schedules observations of scientific and calibration targets, and generates the files necessary to translate the scientific operations into spacecraft actions. If IXPE experiences an anomaly, the LASP team will implement plans to remediate and resume normal operations as soon as possible. The students take part in IXPE’s exploration of a wide variety of celestial targets. In October, for example, students monitored the transmission of data from IXPE’s observations of Swift J1727.8-1613, a bright black hole X-ray binary system. This cosmic object had been recently discovered in September 2023, when NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory detected a gamma-ray burst. IXPE’s specialized instruments allow scientists to measure the polarization of X-rays, which contains information about the source of the X-rays as well as the organization of surrounding magnetic fields. IXPE’s follow-up of the Swift object exemplifies how multiple space missions often combine their individual strengths to paint a fuller scientific picture of distant phenomena. Team members also conduct individual projects. For example, students analyzed how IXPE would fare during both the annular eclipse on Oct. 14, 2023, and the total eclipse that moved across North America on April 8, to make sure that the spacecraft would have adequate power while the Moon partially blocked the Sun. Sam Lippincott, right, a graduate student lead at LASP, trained as a command controller for NASA’s IXPE spacecraft as an undergraduate. In the background are flight controllers Adrienne Pickerill, left, and Alexander Pichler, who also trained as students. NASA/Elizabeth Landau While most of the students working on IXPE at LASP are engineering majors, some are physics or astrophysics majors. Some didn’t initially start their careers in STEM such as flight controller Kacie Davis, who previously studied art. Prospective command controllers go through a rigorous 12-week summer training program working 40 hours per week, learning “everything there is to know about mission operations and how to fly a spacecraft,” Ruswick said. Cole Writer, an aerospace engineering student, remembers this training as “nerve-wracking” because he felt intimidated by the flight controllers. But after practicing procedures on his own laptop, he felt more confident, and completed the program to become a command controller. “It’s nice to be trained by other students who are in the same boat as you and have gone through the same process,” said Adrienne Pickerill, a flight controller who started with the team as a student and earned a master’s in aerospace engineering at the university in May. As a teenager Writer’s interests focused on flying planes, and he saved money to train for a pilot’s license, earning it the summer after high school graduation. Surprisingly, he has found many overlaps in skills for both activities – following checklists and preventing mistakes. “Definitely high stakes in both cases,” he said. While working at LASP, the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, students at the University of Colorado, Boulder, train to become command controllers who work and manage spacecraft. From monitoring IXPE’s health and safety to sending commands to the spacecraft to look at cosmic objects at the request of scientists, these students are getting a one-of-a-kind hands-on experience. (NASA) Sam Lippincott, now a graduate student lead after serving as a command controller as an undergraduate, has been a lifelong sci-fi fan, but took a career in space more seriously his sophomore year of college. “For people that want to go into the aerospace or space operations industry, it’s always important to remember that you’ll never stop learning, and it’s important to remain humble in your abilities, and always be excited to learn more,” he said. De Herrera-Schnering got hooked on the idea of becoming a scientist the first time she saw the Milky Way. On a camping trip when she was 10 years old, she spotted the galaxy as she went to use the outhouse in the middle of the night. “I woke up my parents, and we just laid outside and we were just stargazing,” she said. “After that I knew I was set on what I wanted to do.” Rithik Gangopadhyay, who trained as an undergraduate command controller and continued at LASP as a graduate student lead, had been interested in puzzles and problem-solving as a kid and had a book about planets that fascinated him. “There’s so much out there and so much we don’t know, and I think that’s what really pushed me to do aerospace and do this opportunity of being a command controller,” he said. Coding is key to mission operations, and much of it is done in the Python language. Sometimes the work of flying a spacecraft feels like any other kind of programming — but occasionally, team members step back and consider that they are part of the grand mission of exploring the universe. “If it’s your job for a couple of years, it starts to be like, ‘oh, let’s go ahead and do that, it’s just another Tuesday.’ But if you step back and think about it on a high-level basis, it’s really something special,” Pichler said. “It’s definitely profound.” › Back to Top View the full article

4 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) The cover of the HERC 2025 handbook, which is now available online. By Wayne Smith Following a 2024 competition that garnered international attention, NASA is expanding its Human Exploration Rover Challenge (HERC) to include a remote control division and inviting middle school students to participate. The 31st annual competition is scheduled for April 11-12, 2025, at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. HERC is managed by NASA’s Southeast Regional Office of STEM Engagement at Marshall. The HERC 2025 Handbook has been released, with guidelines for the new remote control (RC) division – ROVR (Remote-Operated Vehicular Research) – and detailing updates for the human-powered division. “Our RC division significantly lowers the barrier to entry for schools who don’t have access to manufacturing facilities, have less funding, or who are motivated to compete but don’t have the technical mentorship required to design and manufacture a safe human-powered rover,” said Chris Joren, HERC technical coordinator. “We are also opening up HERC to middle school students for the first time. The RC division is inherently safer and less physically intensive, so we invite middle school teams and organizations to submit a proposal to be a part of HERC 2025.” Another change for 2025 is the removal of task sites on the course for the human-powered rover division, allowing teams to focus on their rover’s design. Recognized as NASA’s leading international student challenge, the 2025 challenge aims to put competitors in the mindset of the Artemis campaign as they pitch an engineering design for a lunar terrain vehicle – they are astronauts piloting a vehicle, exploring the lunar surface while overcoming various obstacles. “The HERC team wanted to put together a challenge that allows students to gain 21st century skills, workforce readiness skills, and skills that are transferable,” said Vemitra Alexander, HERC activity lead. “The students have opportunities to learn and apply the engineering design process model, gain public speaking skills, participate in community outreach, and learn the art of collaborating with their peers. I am very excited about HERC’s growth and the impact it has on the students we serve nationally and internationally.” Students interested in designing, developing, building, and testing rovers for Moon and Mars exploration are invited to submit their proposals to NASA through Sept. 19. More than 1,000 students with 72 teams from around the world participated in the 2024 challenge as HERC celebrated its 30th anniversary as a NASA competition. Participating teams represented 42 colleges and universities and 30 high schools from 24 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and 13 other nations from around the world. “We saw a massive jump in recognition, not only from within the agency as NASA Chief Technologist A.C. Charania attended the event, but with several of our international teams meeting dignitaries and ambassadors from their home countries to cheer them on,” Joren said. “The most impressive thing will always be the dedication and resilience of the students and their mentors. No matter what gets thrown at these students, they still roll up to the start line singing songs and waving flags.” HERC is one of NASA’s eight Artemis Student Challenges reflecting the goals of the Artemis campaign, which seeks to land the first woman and first person of color on the Moon while establishing a long-term presence for science and exploration. NASA uses such challenges to encourage students to pursue degrees and careers in the STEM fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Since its inception in 1994, more than 15,000 students have participated in HERC – with many former students now working at NASA, or within the aerospace industry. To learn more about HERC, please visit: https://www.nasa.gov/roverchallenge/home/index.html Taylor Goodwin Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. 256.544.0034 taylor.goodwin@nasa.gov Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Related TermsMarshall Space Flight Center Explore More 3 min read NASA, Boeing Optimizing Vehicle Assembly Building High Bay for Future SLS Stage Production Article 1 day ago 5 min read Cassiopeia A, Then the Cosmos: 25 Years of Chandra X-ray Science Article 2 days ago 29 min read The Marshall Star for August 21, 2024 Article 7 days ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Missions Humans in Space Climate Change Solar System View the full article

NASA On Sept. 16, 1994, astronaut Mark C. Lee tested out the Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue (SAFER) system, a system designed for use in the event a crew member becomes untethered while conducting a spacewalk. Occurring during the STS-64 mission, this was the first untethered U.S. spacewalk in 10 years. This SAFER test was the first phase of a larger SAFER program whose objectives were to establish a common set of requirements for both space shuttle and space station program needs, develop a flight demonstration of SAFER, validate system performance and, finally, develop a production version of SAFER for the shuttle and station programs. Image Credit: NASA View the full article

2 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) University of Florida researcher Rob Ferl (seated) and co-principal investigator Anna-Lisa Paul practice the experiment to study the effect of gravity transitions on the plants’ gene expression.University of Florida For the first time, a NASA-funded researcher will fly with their experiment on a commercial suborbital rocket. The technology is one of two NASA-supported experiments, also known as payloads, funded by the agency’s Flight Opportunities program that will launch aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital rocket system on a flight test no earlier than Thursday, Aug. 29. The researcher-tended payload, from the University of Florida in Gainesville, seeks to understand how changes in gravity during spaceflight affect plant biology. Researcher Rob Ferl will activate small, self-contained tubes pre-loaded with plants and preservative to biochemically freeze the samples at various stages of gravity. During the flight, co-principal investigator Anna-Lisa Paul will conduct four identical experiments as a control. After the flight, Ferl and Paul will examine the preserved plants to study the effect of gravity transitions on the plants’ gene expression. Studying how changes in gravity affect plant growth will support future missions to the Moon and Mars. The university’s flight test was funded by a grant awarded through the Flight Opportunities program’s TechFlights solicitation with additional support from NASA’s Division of Biological and Physical Sciences. This experiment builds on NASA’s long history of supporting plant research and aims to accelerate the pace and productivity of space-based research. The other Flight Opportunities supported payload is from HeetShield, a small business in Flagstaff, Arizona. Two new thermal protection system materials will be mounted to the outside of New Shepard’s propulsion module to assess their thermal performance in a relevant environment, since conditions will be similar to planetary entry. After the flight, HeetShield will analyze the structure of the materials to determine how they were affected by the flight. Flight Opportunities, within NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, facilitates demonstration of technologies for space exploration and the expansion of space commerce through suborbital testing with industry flight providers. Through various mechanisms, the program funds flight tests for internal and external technology payloads. To learn more, visit: https://www.nasa.gov/space-technology-mission-directorate/ Facebook logo @NASATechnology @NASA_Technology Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Space Technology Mission Directorate STMD Solicitations and Opportunities Access Flight Tests STMD Small Spacecraft Technology Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 EditorLoura Hall Related TermsSpace Technology Mission DirectorateFlight Opportunities ProgramTechnologyTechnology for Space Travel View the full article

Official portrait of NASA astronaut Jonny Kim in an EMU suit.Credit: NASA During his first mission to the International Space Station, NASA astronaut Jonny Kim will serve as a flight engineer and member of the upcoming Expedition 72/73 crew. Kim will launch on the Roscosmos Soyuz MS-27 spacecraft in March 2025, accompanied by Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Alexey Zubritsky. The trio will spend approximately eight months at the space station. While aboard the orbiting laboratory, Kim will conduct scientific investigations and technology demonstrations to help prepare the crew for future space missions and provide benefits to people on Earth. NASA selected Kim as an astronaut in 2017. After completing the initial astronaut candidate training, Kim supported mission and crew operations in various roles including the Expedition 65 lead operations officer, T-38 operations liaison, and space station capcom chief engineer. A native of Los Angeles, Kim is a United States Navy lieutenant commander and dual designated naval aviator and flight surgeon. Kim also served as an enlisted Navy SEAL. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Mathematics from the University of San Diego and a medical degree from Harvard Medical School in Boston, and completed his internship with the Harvard Affiliated Emergency Medicine Residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. For more than two decades, humans have lived and worked continuously aboard the International Space Station, advancing scientific knowledge, and making research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. The station is a critical testbed for NASA to understand and overcome the challenges of long-duration spaceflight and to expand commercial opportunities in low Earth orbit. As commercial companies focus on providing human space transportation services and destinations as part of a robust low Earth orbit economy, NASA is able to more fully focus its resources on deep space missions to the Moon and Mars. Get breaking news, images and features from the space station on the station blog, Instagram, Facebook, and X. Learn more about International Space Station research and operations at: https://www.nasa.gov/station -end- Josh Finch / Claire O’Shea Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1100 joshua.a.finch@nasa.gov / claire.a.o’shea@nasa.gov Courtney Beasley Johnson Space Center, Houston 281-483-5111 courtney.m.beasley@nasa.gov Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 LocationNASA Headquarters Related TermsJonny KimAstronautsHumans in SpaceInternational Space Station (ISS)ISS Research View the full article

7 Min Read NASA Project in Puerto Rico Trains Students in Marine Biology A forested green peninsula of Culebra Island juts into the blue waters of the Caribbean as a rain storm hits in the distance. The teal blue surrounding the island indicates shallow waters, home to the island's famous coral reefs. Credits: NASA Ames/Milan Loiacono Tainaliz Marie Rodríguez Lugo took a deep breath, adjusted her snorkel mask, and plunged into the ocean, fins first. Three weeks earlier, Rodríguez Lugo couldn’t swim. Now the college student was gathering data on water quality and coral reefs for a NASA-led marine biology project in Puerto Rico, where she lives. “There is so much life down there that I never knew about,” Rodríguez Lugo said. “And it’s beautiful.” “There is so much life down there that I never knew about, and it’s beautiful.” Tainaliz Marie Rodríguez Lugo OCEANOS 2024 Intern The sea whip and purple sea fans in the photo above are found off the coast of Playa Melones, Culebra, a small island off the east cost of Puerto Rico and a popular destination for snorkelers. Puerto Rico is home to more than 1,300 square miles of coral reefs, which play a vital role in protecting the island from storms, waves, and hurricanes. Reef-related tourism provides nearly $2 billion in annual income for the island. But coral reefs in Puerto Rico and around the world are experiencing more frequent and severe bleaching events. High ocean temperatures in regions around the globe have led to coral bleaching, which is when corals expel zooxanthellae – the colorful, symbiotic microscopic algae that live inside coral tissues and provide 80-90% of its nutrients. When stressors persist, the corals eventually starve and turn bone-white. In April 2024, NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) announced that the world was experiencing a global bleaching event, the fourth on record. You can see bleached spots in the lobed star coral pictured above, which is also colonized by Ramicrusta, an invasive, burnt orange algae that poses an additional threat to reefs. Students Are Given Ocean Research Tools Beginning in June, the month-long program that Rodriguez and 29 other local students participated in is called the Ocean Community Engagement and Awareness using NASA Earth Observations and Science for Hispanic/Latino Students (OCEANOS). The goal of OCEANOS is twofold: to teach Puerto Rican students about marine ecology and conservation, and to train students through hands-on fieldwork how to use marine science tools to monitor the health of coral reefs. The course included classroom instruction, scientific fieldwork, collecting and analyzing ocean data from La Parguera and Culebra Island, and a final presentation. In the photo, OCEANOS instructor Samuel Suleiman shows a 3D-printed clump of staghorn coral to a group of students off the coast of Culebra. In areas where coral habitats have been damaged, conservationists use 3D-printed corals to attract and protect fish, algae, and other wildlife. To practice coral surveying techniques and evaluate biodiversity,students used compact cameras to snap a photo every half second, recording seven-meter by seven-meter quadrants of the ocean floor. Back on land, the students stitched these images – roughly 600 images per quadrant – into high-resolution mosaics, which they then used to catalog the types and distributions of various coral species. Low Light, Poor Water Quality, and Invasive Species Threaten Coral Reefs Students also built their own low-cost instruments, with sensors on each end to measure temperature and light, to help assess water quality and characteristics. The ideal temperature range for coral falls between 77- 82 degrees Fahrenheit (25-28 degrees Celsius). Water above or below this range is considered a potential stressor for coral and can impair growth. It can also increase the risk of disease, bleaching, and reproductive issues. Coral relies on light for growth. Less light means less photosynthesis for the zooxanthellae that live inside the coral, which in turn means less food for the coral itself. Cloudy water due to excessive sediment or phytoplankton can dim or block sunlight. Additional threats to coral include fishing equipment, boat groundings, chemical runoff, and invasive species. In the photo above, OCEANOS instructor Juan Torres-Pérez holds two clumps of cyanobacteria, a type of bacteria that has choked a section of reef near Playa Melones. The exact cause of this excessive cyanobacteria growth is unclear, but it is likely due to land-based pollution leaching into nearby waters, he said. In the background, dark brown piles of cyanobacteria littering the ocean floor are visible. Students Help Grow and Plant New Coral Suleiman walked students through the process of planting new coral, which involved tying loose staghorn and elkhorn corals into a square frame. Each frame holds about 100 individual pieces of coral. Suleiman leads a group called Sociedad Ambiente Marino (SAM), which has been working for more than 20 years to cultivate and plant more than 160,000 corals around Puerto Rico. Divers anchored these frames to the ocean floor. Under ideal conditions, branching species like elkhorn and staghorn coral grow one centimeter per month, or about 12-13 centimeters per year, making them ideal candidates for coral reef restoration. By comparison, mountainous and boulder coral, also prevalent in the Caribbean Sea, grow an average of just one centimeter per year. The frames will remain on the ocean floor for 10 to 14 months, until the corals have quadrupled in size. At any given time, SAM has about 45 of these frames in coral ‘farms’ around Culebra, totaling almost 4,500 corals. Once the corals are ready to be planted, they will be added to various reefs to replace damaged or bleached corals, and shore up vulnerable habitats. In the photo above, Suleiman gathers loose corals to place around an endangered coral species Dendrogyra cylindrus, more commonly referred to as Pillar Coral (front left). This underwater “garden,” as he called it, should attract fish and wildlife such as sea urchins, which will give the endangered coral — and the other species in this small reef — a better chance of survival. A New Generation of Marine Scientists From the 2023 OCEANOS class, roughly half of the undergraduate students went on to pursue marine science degrees, and many hope to continue with a post-graduate program. For a scientific field historically lacking diverse voices, this is a promising step. Among the high school students in the 2023 class, three went on to change their degree plans to oceanography after participating in the OCEANOS program, while others are finding ways to incorporate marine science into their studies. Francisco Méndez Negrón, a 2023 OCEANOS graduate, is now a computer science student at the University of Puerto Rico at Rio Piedras and wants to apply robotics to marine ecology. “My goal is to integrate computer science and oceanography to make something that can contribute to the problems marine ecosystems are facing, mostly originated by us humans,” Méndez Negrón said. He returned to the OCEANOS program to serve as a mentor for the 2024 class. As for Tainaliz Marie Rodriguez Lugo, she managed to overcome her swim anxiety while discovering a love of the ocean. She credited the instructors who were patient, encouraging, and never left her side in the water. “I was really scared going into this internship,” Rodríguez Lugo said. “I didn’t know how to swim, and I was starting a program literally called ‘Oceans.’ But now I love it: I could spend all day in the ocean.” I was really scared going into this internship. I didn’t know how to swim, and I was starting a program literally called ‘Oceans.’ But now I love it: I could spend all day in the ocean. Tainaliz Marie Rodríguez Lugo OCEANOS 2024 Intern When asked how she would describe coral to someone who has never seen one, Rodríguez Lugo just laughed. “I can’t. There are no words for it. I would just take them to the reefs.” For more information about OCEANOS, visit: https://www.nasa.gov/oceanos The OCEANOS program’s final session will take place next year. Applications for the 2025 OCEANOS program will open in March. To apply, visit: https://nasa.gov/oceanos-application Photographs and story by Milan Loiacono, NASA’s Ames Research Center About the AuthorMilan LoiaconoScience Communication SpecialistMilan Loiacono is a science communication specialist for the Earth Science Division at NASA Ames Research Center. Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Related TermsGeneralAmes Research CenterAmes Research Center's Science DirectorateClimate ChangeEarthEarth Science DivisionOpportunities For Students to Get InvolvedScience ActivationScience Mission Directorate Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Missions Humans in Space Climate Change Solar System View the full article

Earlier this month, nine small businesses received 2023 NASA Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Ignite Phase II awards to further develop technologies that may be used in the agency’s missions and in the commercial space industry. The SBIR Ignite Phase II awardees, who will receive up to $850,000 to fund their projects, are developing technology capabilities in the detection of wildfires, support for water management in agriculture, in-space debris detection, mineral mining from lunar regolith, in-space production, and more. These capabilities are vital to supporting deep space exploration, low Earth orbit missions, and preserving life on our home planet for the benefit of all. The businesses initially were selected for Phase I awards in 2023 and provided six months and up to $150,000 to prove their concepts before competing for Phase II. “We want to support innovators across the aerospace industry because their technologies have the potential to make a big impact in the commercial market. A rich and diverse marketplace creates more opportunity for us all. These Phase II awards illuminate a clear path for a unique range of technologies that we believe will positively influence the lives of all Americans.” Jason L. Kessler NASA SBIR/STTR Program Executive The SBIR Ignite pilot initiative supports product-driven small businesses, startups, and entrepreneurs that have commercialization at the forefront of their innovation strategies and processes but that are not targeting NASA as a primary customer. The pilot initiative provides funding and other support to mitigate risk in technologies that have strong commercial potential by offering lower barriers to entry, a streamlined review and selection process, and accelerated technology development and awards as compared to the NASA SBIR program’s main solicitation. It also focuses on helping make participating companies more appealing to investors, customers, and partners, while fulfilling SBIR’s mission of increasing commercialization of innovations derived from federal research and development. While the agency’s main Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer solicitations focus on technologies with potential for infusion in both NASA missions and commercialization in the marketplace, the SBIR Ignite opportunity is less prescriptive and focuses on topics that are relevant to emerging commercial markets in aerospace, such as accelerating in-space production applications in low Earth orbit. The awarded companies are: Astral Forge, LLC, Palo Alto, California Astrobotic Technology Inc., Pittsburgh Benchmark Space Systems, Burlington, Vermont Brayton Energy, LLC, Hampton, New Hampshire Channel-Logistics LLC dba Space-Eyes, Miami GeoVisual Analytics, Westminster, Colorado Space Lab Technologies, LLC, Boulder, Colorado Space Tango, Lexington, Kentucky VerdeGo Aero, De Leon Springs, Florida The third year of NASA Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Ignite is underway, as the 2024 SBIR Ignite Phase I solicitation closed on July 30, 2024. Those selections are expected to be announced Fall 2024. NASA’s Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer program is part of NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate and is managed by NASA’s Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley. View the full article

The SpaceX Dragon Endurance crew ship, carrying four Crew-5 members, approaches the International Space Station with the Earth’s horizon in the background. Credit: NASA/Kjell Lindgren NASA is extending U.S. media accreditation for the launch of the agency’s ninth rotational mission of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft that will carry astronauts to the International Space Station. This mission is part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. The application period for U.S. media and U.S. citizens representing international media organizations is extended until 11:59 p.m. EDT on Tuesday, Sept. 3. Media members who have already applied do not need to reapply. All new accreditation requests must be submitted online at: https://media.ksc.nasa.gov Launch of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-9 mission, originally slated with four crew members, is targeted for no earlier than Tuesday, Sept. 24, from Space Launch Complex-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. NASA announced astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams will remain on station and return home in February 2025 aboard Dragon with two other crew members assigned to the Crew-9 mission, during a news conference on Aug. 24. The agency will share more information about the Crew-9 complement when details are finalized. NASA and SpaceX currently are working on several items before launch, including reconfiguring seats on the Dragon and adjusting the manifest to carry additional cargo, personal effects, and Dragon-specific spacesuits for Wilmore and Williams. NASA’s media accreditation policy is available online. For questions about accreditation or special logistical requests, email: ksc-media-accreditat@mail.nasa.gov. Requests for space for satellite trucks, tents, or electrical connections also are due by Sept. 3. For other questions, please contact NASA Kennedy’s newsroom at: 321-867-2468. Para obtener información sobre cobertura en español en el Centro Espacial Kennedy o si desea solicitar entrevistas en español, comuníquese con Antonia Jaramillo: 321-501-8425, o Messod Bendayan: 256-930-1371. For launch coverage and more information about the mission, visit: https://www.nasa.gov/commercialcrew -end- Joshua Finch / Claire O’Shea Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1100 joshua.a.finch@nasa.gov / claire.a.o’shea@nasa.gov Steve Siceloff / Danielle Sempsrott / Stephanie Plucinsky Kennedy Space Center, Florida 321-867-2468 steven.p.siceloff@nasa.gov / danielle.c.sempsrott@nasa.gov / stephanie.n.plucinsky@nasa.gov Leah Cheshier Johnson Space Center, Houston 281-483-5111 leah.d.cheshier@nasa.gov View the full article

On Aug. 28, 2009, space shuttle Discovery began its 37th trip into space. The 17A mission to the International Space Station was the 30th shuttle flight to the orbiting lab. During the 14-day mission, the seven-member STS-128 crew worked with Expedition 20, the first six-person crew aboard the station, during nine days of docked operations. In addition to completing a one-for-one long-duration crew member exchange, they delivered more than seven tons of supplies, including three new payload racks and three systems to maintain a six-person crew aboard the space station. They completed three spacewalks to perform maintenance on the facility, prepare the station for the arrival of the next module, and retrieve two science experiments for return to Earth. Left: The STS-128 crew patch. Middle: Official photograph of the STS-128 crew of José M. Hernández, left, Kevin A. Ford, John D. “Danny” Olivas, Nicole P. Stott, A. Christer Fuglesang of Sweden representing the European Space Agency, Frederick “Rick” W. Sturckow, and Patrick G. Forrester. Right: The 17A mission patch. The seven-person STS-128 crew consisted of Commander Frederick “Rick” W. Sturckow, Pilot Kevin A. Ford, and Mission Specialists Patrick G. Forrester, José M. Hernández, John D. “Danny” Olivas, and A. Christer Fuglesang of Sweden representing the European Space Agency (ESA), and Nicole P. Stott. Primary objectives of the mission included the launch to the station of facilities required to maintain a permanent six-person crew and the exchange of Stott for Timothy L. Kopra who had been aboard the space station since July 2009 as a member of Expedition 20. The facilities, launched inside the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM), included an additional Crew Quarters, the T2 COLBERT treadmill, and an Air Revitalization System rack. Three payload racks – the Materials Science Research Rack, the Fluids Integrated Rack, and the second Minus Eighty-degree Laboratory Freezer for ISS – also rode inside the MPLM for transfer to the station to expand its research capabilities. Left: The STS-128 crew at the conclusion of the Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Middle: Space shuttle Discovery during the rollout to Launch Pad 39A. Right: The Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module in Discovery’s payload bay at Launch Pad 39A. Discovery returned from its previous mission, STS-119, on March 28, 2009, and workers towed it to the Orbiter Processing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC). The orbiter rolled over to the Vehicle Assembly Building on July 26, and after mating with its external tank and twin solid rocket boosters, rolled out to Launch Pad 39A on Aug. 4, targeting Aug. 25 for launch. Three days later, the seven-member crew participated in the Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test, essentially a dress rehearsal of the actual countdown for launch, returned to Houston for final training. They arrived at KSC on Aug 19 to prepare for launch. Left: Liftoff of space shuttle Discovery on STS-128. Right: Discovery streaks into the night sky. Clouds and lighting in the launch area forced a scrub of the first launch attempt on Aug. 25, while a faulty valve indicator scrubbed the next day’s attempt. On Aug. 28, at 11:59 p.m. EDT, space shuttle Discovery lifted off from Launch Pad 39A to begin its 37th trip into space, carrying its seven-member crew on the 17A space station outfitting and resupply mission. Eight and a half minutes later, Discovery and its crew had reached orbit. This marked Sturckow’s fourth time in space, Forrester’s third, Olivas’ and Fuglesang’s second, while Ford, Hernández, and Stott enjoyed their first taste of weightlessness. First time space flyers Kevin A. Ford, left, José M. Hernández, and Nicole P. Stott enjoying the first few minutes of weightlessness shortly after reaching orbit. After reaching orbit, the crew opened the payload bay doors and deployed the shuttle’s radiators, and removed their bulky launch and entry suits, stowing them for the remainder of the flight. The astronauts spent five hours on their second day in space conducting a detailed inspection of Discovery’s nose cap and wing leading edges, with Ford, Forrester, and Hernández taking turns operating the Shuttle Remote Manipulator System (SRMS), or robotic arm, and the Orbiter Boom Sensor System (OBSS). Left: Frederick “Rick” W. Sturckow, left, and Kevin A. Ford perform maneuvers for the rendezvous with the space station. Middle: Discovery as seen from the space station during the rendezvous. Right: The space station as seen from Discovery during the rendezvous. On the mission’s third day, Sturckow assisted by his crewmates brought Discovery in for a docking with the space station. The docking occurred on the 25th anniversary of Discovery’s first launch on the STS-41D mission on Aug. 30, 1984. During the rendezvous, Sturckow stopped the approach at 600 feet and completed the Rendezvous Pitch Maneuver so astronauts aboard the station could photograph Discovery’s underside to look for any damage to the tiles. Shortly after docking, the crews opened the hatches between the two spacecraft and the six-person station crew welcomed the seven-member shuttle crew. After exchanging Soyuz spacesuits and seat liners, Stott joined the Expedition 20 crew and Kopra the STS-128 crew. Left: Transfer of Timothy L. Kopra’s Soyuz seat liner and spacesuit from the space station to the space shuttle makes him an STS-128 crew member for return to Earth. Middle:Kevin A. Ford, left, and Michael R. Barratt operate the station’s robotic arm to transfer the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM) from the shuttle payload bay to the space station. Right: The MPLM approaches the Node 2 nadir berthing port. Left: Frank DeWinne, left, and A. Christer Fuglesang, both of the European Space Agency, open the hatch to the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module. Middle: José M. Hernández inside the MPLM to monitor transfer operations. Right: DeWinne, left, and Fuglesang begin the transfer of the T2 COLBERT treadmill from the MPLM to the space station. The day after docking, Ford and Expedition 20 Flight Engineer Michael R. Barrrat used the space station’s robotic arm to grapple the MPLM in the shuttle’s payload bay. They transferred it to the station, berthing it at the Harmony Node 2 module’s nadir port. The crew activated the MPLM and Fuglesang and Expedition 20 Commander Frank L. DeWinne of Belgium representing ESA opened the hatches, enabling the start of cargo transfers. Left: During the first spacewalk, John D. “Danny” Olivas, left, and Nicole P. Stott remove the EuTEF experiment from the Columbus module. Middle left: Stott rides the station robotic arm carrying the EuTEF experiment, with the removed Ammonia Tank Assembly attached to it. Middle right: An open MISSE container showing the various exposure samples. Right: Stott carrying one of the two closed MISSE containers. During the mission’s first spacewalk on flight day five, Olivas and Stott first removed a used Ammonia Tank Assembly (ATA) from the P1 truss segment. With Ford and Expedition 20 Flight Engineer Robert B. Thirsk of the Canadian Space Agency operating the space station’s robotic arm, they moved Stott to the end of the Columbus module, where she and Olivas removed the European Technology Exposure Facility (EuTEF) science payload. Ford and Thirsk translated Stott to the shuttle’s payload bay where she and Olivas stowed it for return to Earth. The pair returned to Columbus to close and retrieve the two Materials on International Space Station Experiments (MISSE) and stowed them in the payload bay for return. This first spacewalk lasted 6 hours 35 minutes. Meanwhile, other crew members busied themselves with transferring racks and cargo from the MPLM to the space station. Left: A. Christer Fugelsang of the European Space Agency shows off his installation of the Air Revitalization System rack in the Kibo module. Middle: Patrick G. Forrester with three bags during cargo transfer operations. Right: During handover operations, outgoing space station crew member Timothy L. Kopra, middle, shows incoming crew member Nicole P. Stott how to give a proper haircut in space. Left: Frederick “Rick” W. Sturckow, left, and Patrick G. Forrester seen through an overhead window. Middle: During the mission’s second spacewalk, A. Christer Fuglesang carries both the old and the new Ammonia Tank Assemblies (ATA) on the end of the space station robotic arm. Right: Fuglesang stowing the old ATA in the shuttle’s payload bay. Cargo transfers continued throughout flight day six, including the three payload racks. On flight day seven, Olivas and Fuglesang conducted the mission’s second spacewalk, lasting 6 hours 39 minutes. They completed the swap out of the ATA, with Fuglesang riding the station arm carrying both the old and the new units, before they installed the new unit on the P1 truss, and then returned with the old unit to stow it in the payload bay. Left: John D. “Danny” Olivas works in the shuttle’s payload bay during the mission’s third spacewalk. Right: Olivas, left, and A. Christer Fuglesang work on the space station truss. With cargo transfers continuing on flight day eight, the next day Olivas and Fuglesang stepped outside for the mission’s third and final spacewalk. They completed a variety of tasks, including routing cables to accommodate the Tranquility Node 3 module scheduled to arrive on a future space shuttle flight, and installing GPS antennas on the S0 truss. This spacewalk lasted 7 hours 1 minute, bringing the total spacewalking time for STS-128 to 20 hours 15 minutes. The crew enjoyed a well-deserved off-duty day on flight day 10. Left: Astronauts robotically stow the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM) back in Discovery’s payload bay. Right: A. Christer Fuglesang, left, and Nicole P. Stott operate the space station’s robotic arm to stow the MPLM in the payload bay. The astronauts completed the final transfers on Sept. 8, the mission’s 11th flight day, they deactivated the MPLM, and closed its hatch. Operating the space station’s robotic arm, Stott and Fuglesang transferred the MPLM from the station back to the shuttle’s payload bay. On Sept. 10, the next vehicle to occupy that port, the Japanese H-II Transfer Vehicle-1 (HTV-1), launched from the Tanegashima Space Center, arriving at the station one week later. Left: The 13 members of Expedition 20, blue shirts, and STS-128, red shirts, pose for a final photograph before saying their farewells. Right: Four members of the astronaut class of 2000 in space together. Left: Kevin A. Ford pilots Discovery for the undocking and flyaround. Right: The space station seen from Discovery during the flyaround. That same day, they held a brief farewell ceremony, parted company, and closed the hatches between the two spacecraft. The next day, with Ford at the controls, Discovery undocked from the space station, having spent nine days as a single spacecraft. Ford completed a flyaround of the station, with the astronauts photographing it to document its condition. A final separation burn sent Discovery on its way. Ford, Forrester, and Hernández used the shuttle’s arm to pick up the OBSS and perform a late inspection of Discovery’s thermal protection system. On flight day 13, Sturckow and Ford tested Discovery’s reaction control system thrusters and flight control surfaces in preparation for the next day’s entry and landing. The entire crew busied themselves with stowing all unneeded equipment. Bad weather at KSC delayed the landing by a day, and more bad weather diverted the landing to Edwards Air Force Base in California. Left: Discovery touches down at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Middle: The Crew Transport Vehicle has approached Discovery to enable the astronauts to exit the vehicle. Right: Discovery atop its Shuttle Carrier Aircraft departs Edwards for NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Left: Six of the STS-128 astronauts pose with Discovery on the runway at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Right: The welcome home ceremony for the STS-128 crew at Ellington Field in Houston. On Sept. 11, the astronauts closed Discovery’s payload bay doors, donned their launch and entry suits, and strapped themselves into their seats, a special recumbent one for Kopra who had spent the last two months in weightlessness. Sturckow fired Discovery’s two Orbital Maneuvering System engines to bring them out of orbit and head for a landing half an orbit later. He guided Discovery to a smooth touchdown at Edwards, as it turned out the final space shuttle landing at the California facility. The landing capped off a very successful STS-128 mission of 13 days, 20 hours, 54 minutes. They orbited the planet 219 times. Kopra spent 58 days, 2 hours, 50 minutes in space, completing 920 orbits of the Earth. Workers placed Discovery atop a Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, a modified Boeing 747, to ferry it back to KSC where it landed on Sept. 21. Engineers began preparing it for its next flight, STS-131 in April 2010. Enjoy the crew narrate a video about the STS-128 mission. Explore More 10 min read 40 Years Ago: President Reagan Announces Teacher in Space Project Article 1 day ago 12 min read 55 Years Ago: Apollo 11 Astronauts End Quarantine, Feted from Coast to Coast Article 1 week ago 7 min read 55 Years Ago: NASA Group 7 Astronaut Selection Article 2 weeks ago View the full article

6 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) A mirror that was later installed inside the telescope for NASA’s Near-Earth Object Surveyor shows a reflection of principal optical engineer Brian Monacelli during an inspection of the mirror’s surface at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on July 17.NASA/JPL-Caltech A technician operates articulating equipment to rotate NEO Surveyor’s aluminum optical bench — part of the spacecraft’s telescope — in a clean room at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California on July 17.NASA/JPL-Caltech The mirrors for NASA’s Near-Earth Object Surveyor space telescope are being installed and aligned, and work on other spacecraft components is accelerating. NASA’s new asteroid-hunting spacecraft is taking shape at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. Called NEO Surveyor (Near-Earth Object Surveyor), this cutting-edge infrared space telescope will seek out the hardest-to-find asteroids and comets that might pose a hazard to our planet. In fact, it is the agency’s first space telescope designed specifically for planetary defense. Targeting launch in late 2027, the spacecraft will travel a million miles to a region of gravitational stability — called the L1 Lagrange point — between Earth and the Sun. From there, its large sunshade will block the glare and heat of sunlight, allowing the mission to discover and track near-Earth objects as they approach Earth from the direction of the Sun, which is difficult for other observatories to do. The space telescope also may reveal asteroids called Earth Trojans, which lead and trail our planet’s orbit and are difficult to see from the ground or from Earth orbit. NEO Surveyor relies on cutting-edge detectors that observe two bands of infrared light, which is invisible to the human eye. Near-Earth objects, no matter how dark, glow brightly in infrared as the Sun heats them. Because of this, the telescope will be able to find dark asteroids and comets, which don’t reflect much visible light. It also will measure those objects, a challenging task for visible-light telescopes that have a hard time distinguishing between small, highly reflective objects and large, dark ones. This artist’s concept depicts NASA’s NEO Surveyor in deep space. The black-paneled angular structure in the belly of the spacecraft is the instrument enclosure that is being built at JPL. The mission’s infrared telescope will be installed inside the enclosure.NASA/JPL-Caltech “NEO Surveyor is optimized to help us to do one specific thing: enable humanity to find the most hazardous asteroids and comets far enough in advance so we can do something about them,” said Amy Mainzer, principal investigator for NEO Surveyor and a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. “We aim to build a spacecraft that can find, track, and characterize the objects with the greatest chance of hitting Earth. In the process, we will learn a lot about their origins and evolution.” Coming Into Focus The spacecraft’s only instrument is its telescope. About the size of a washer-and-dryer set, the telescope’s blocky aluminum body, called the optical bench, was built in a JPL clean room. Known as a three-mirror anastigmat telescope, it will rely on curved mirrors to focus light onto its infrared detectors in such a way that minimizes optical aberrations. “We have been carefully managing the fabrication of the spacecraft’s telescope mirrors, all of which were received in the JPL clean room by July,” said Brian Monacelli, principal optical engineer at JPL. “Its mirrors were shaped and polished from solid aluminum using a diamond-turning machine. Each exceeds the mission’s performance requirements.” Monacelli inspected the mirror surfaces for debris and damage, then JPL’s team of optomechanical technicians and engineers attached the mirrors to the telescope’s optical bench in August. Next, they will measure the telescope’s performance and align its mirrors. Complementing the mirror assembly are the telescope’s mercury-cadmium-telluride detectors, which are similar to the detectors used by NASA’s recently retired NEOWISE (short for Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer) mission. An advantage of these detectors is that they don’t necessarily require cryogenic coolers or cryogens to lower their operational temperatures in order to detect infrared wavelengths. Cryocoolers and cryogens can limit the lifespan of a spacecraft. NEO Surveyor will instead keep its cool by using its large sunshade to block sunlight from heating the telescope and by occupying an orbit beyond that of the Moon, minimizing heating from Earth. The telescope will eventually be installed inside the spacecraft’s instrument enclosure, which is being assembled in JPL’s historic High Bay 1 clean room where NASA missions such as Voyager, Cassini, and Perseverance were constructed. Fabricated from dark composite material that allows heat to escape, the enclosure will help keep the telescope cool and prevent its own heat from obscuring observations. Once it is completed in coming weeks, the enclosure will be tested to make sure it can withstand the rigors of space exploration. Then it will be mounted on the back of the sunshade and atop the electronic systems that will power and control the spacecraft. “The entire team has been working hard for a long time to get to this point, and we are excited to see the hardware coming together with contributions from our institutional and industrial collaborators from across the country,” said Tom Hoffman, NEO Surveyor’s project manager at JPL. “From the panels and cables for the instrument enclosure to the detectors and mirrors for the telescope — as well as components to build the spacecraft — hardware is being fabricated, delivered, and assembled to build this incredible observatory.” Assembly of NEO Surveyor can be viewed 24 hours a day, seven days a week, via JPL’s live cam. More About NEO Surveyor The NEO Surveyor mission marks a major step for NASA toward reaching its U.S. Congress-mandated goal to discover and characterize at least 90% of the near-Earth objects more than 460 feet (140 meters) across that come within 30 million miles (48 million kilometers) of our planet’s orbit. Objects of this size can cause significant regional damage, or worse, should they impact the Earth. The mission is tasked by NASA’s Planetary Science Division within the Science Mission Directorate; program oversight is provided by the Planetary Defense Coordination Office, which was established in 2016 to manage the agency’s ongoing efforts in planetary defense. NASA’s Planetary Missions Program Office at the agency’s Marshall Space Flight Center provides program management for NEO Surveyor. The project is being developed by JPL and is led by principal investigator Amy Mainzer at UCLA. Established aerospace and engineering companies have been contracted to build the spacecraft and its instrumentation, including BAE Systems, Space Dynamics Laboratory, and Teledyne. The Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado, Boulder will support operations, and IPAC-Caltech in Pasadena, California, is responsible for processing survey data and producing the mission’s data products. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. More information about NEO Surveyor is available at: https://science.nasa.gov/mission/neo-surveyor News Media Contacts Ian J. O’Neill Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 818-354-2649 ian.j.oneill@jpl.nasa.gov Karen Fox / Alana Johnson NASA Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1600 / 202-358-1501 karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / alana.r.johnson@nasa.gov 2024-114 Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Related TermsNEO Surveyor (Near-Earth Object Surveyor Space Telescope)CometsJet Propulsion LaboratoryNear-Earth Asteroid (NEA)Planetary DefensePlanetary Defense Coordination Office Explore More 5 min read NASA’s Europa Clipper Gets Set of Super-Size Solar Arrays Article 23 hours ago 2 min read NASA’s DART Team Earns AIAA Space Systems Award for Pioneering Mission NASA’s DART (Double​ Asteroid Redirection Test) mission continues to yield scientific discoveries and garner accolades for its groundbreaking… Article 7 days ago 5 min read Danish Instrument Helps NASA’s Juno Spacecraft See Radiation Article 1 week ago Keep Exploring Discover Related Topics Missions Humans in Space Climate Change Solar System View the full article

6 Min Read NASA Discovers a Long-Sought Global Electric Field on Earth The geographic North Pole seen from the Endurance rocket ship at 477 miles (768 kilometers) altitude above the Arctic. The faint red and green streaks at the top of the image are artifacts of lens flare. Credits: NASA Key Points A rocket team reports the first successful detection of Earth’s ambipolar electric field: a weak, planet-wide electric field as fundamental as Earth’s gravity and magnetic fields. First hypothesized more than 60 years ago, the ambipolar electric field is a key driver of the “polar wind,” a steady outflow of charged particles into space that occurs above Earth’s poles. This electric field lifts charged particles in our upper atmosphere to greater heights than they would otherwise reach and may have shaped our planet’s evolution in ways yet to be explored. Using observations from a NASA suborbital rocket, an international team of scientists has, for the first time, successfully measured a planet-wide electric field thought to be as fundamental to Earth as its gravity and magnetic fields. Known as the ambipolar electric field, scientists first hypothesized over 60 years ago that it drove how our planet’s atmosphere can escape above Earth’s North and South Poles. Measurements from the rocket, NASA’s Endurance mission, have confirmed the existence of the ambipolar field and quantified its strength, revealing its role in driving atmospheric escape and shaping our ionosphere — a layer of the upper atmosphere — more broadly. Understanding the complex movements and evolution of our planet’s atmosphere provides clues not only to the history of Earth but also gives us insight into the mysteries of other planets and determining which ones might be hospitable to life. The paper was published Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2024, in the journal Nature. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Lacey Young Download this video and related animations from NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio. An Electric Field Drawing Particles Out to Space Since the late 1960s, spacecraft flying over Earth’s poles have detected a stream of particles flowing from our atmosphere into space. Theorists predicted this outflow, which they dubbed the “polar wind,” spurring research to understand its causes. Some amount of outflow from our atmosphere was expected. Intense, unfiltered sunlight should cause some particles from our air to escape into space, like steam evaporating from a pot of water. But the observed polar wind was more mysterious. Many particles within it were cold, with no signs they had been heated — yet they were traveling at supersonic speeds. “Something had to be drawing these particles out of the atmosphere,” said Glyn Collinson, principal investigator of Endurance at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and lead author of the paper. Scientists suspected a yet-to-be-discovered electric field could be at work. The hypothesized electric field, generated at the subatomic scale, was expected to be incredibly weak, with its effects felt only over hundreds of miles. For decades, detecting it was beyond the limits of existing technology. In 2016, Collinson and his team got to work inventing a new instrument they thought was up to the task of measuring Earth’s ambipolar field. Launching a Rocket from the Arctic The team’s instruments and ideas were best suited for a suborbital rocket flight launched from the Arctic. In a nod to the ship that carried Ernest Shackleton on his famous 1914 voyage to Antarctica, the team named their mission Endurance. The scientists set a course for Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago just a few hundred miles from the North Pole and home to the northernmost rocket range in the world. “Svalbard is the only rocket range in the world where you can fly through the polar wind and make the measurements we needed,” said Suzie Imber, a space physicist at the University of Leicester, UK, and co-author of the paper. On May 11, 2022, Endurance launched and reached an altitude of 477.23 miles (768.03 kilometers), splashing down 19 minutes later in the Greenland Sea. Across the 322-mile altitude range where it collected data, Endurance measured a change in electric potential of only 0.55 volts. “A half a volt is almost nothing — it’s only about as strong as a watch battery,” Collinson said. “But that’s just the right amount to explain the polar wind.” The Endurance rocket ship launches from Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard. Credit: Andøya Space/Leif Jonny Eilertsen Hydrogen ions, the most abundant type of particle in the polar wind, experience an outward force from this field 10.6 times stronger than gravity. “That’s more than enough to counter gravity — in fact, it’s enough to launch them upwards into space at supersonic speeds,” said Alex Glocer, Endurance project scientist at NASA Goddard and co-author of the paper. Heavier particles also get a boost. Oxygen ions at that same altitude, immersed in this half-a-volt field, weigh half as much. In general, the team found that the ambipolar field increases what’s known as the “scale height” of the ionosphere by 271%, meaning the ionosphere remains denser to greater heights than it would be without it. “It’s like this conveyor belt, lifting the atmosphere up into space,” Collinson added. Endurance’s discovery has opened many new paths for exploration. The ambipolar field, as a fundamental energy field of our planet alongside gravity and magnetism, may have continuously shaped the evolution of our atmosphere in ways we can now begin to explore. Because it’s created by the internal dynamics of an atmosphere, similar electric fields are expected to exist on other planets, including Venus and Mars. “Any planet with an atmosphere should have an ambipolar field,” Collinson said. “Now that we’ve finally measured it, we can begin learning how it’s shaped our planet as well as others over time.” By Miles Hatfield and Rachel Lense NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. Endurance was a NASA-funded mission conducted through the Sounding Rocket Program at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The Svalbard Rocket Range is owned and operated by Andøya Space. The European Incoherent Scatter Scientific Association (EISCAT) Svalbard radar, located in Longyearbyen, made ground-based measurements of the ionosphere critical to interpreting the rocket data. The United Kingdom Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Research Council of Norway (RCN) funded the EISCAT radar for the Endurance mission. EISCAT is owned and operated by research institutes and research councils of Norway, Sweden, Finland, Japan, China, and the United Kingdom (the EISCAT Associates). The Endurance mission team encompasses affiliates of the Catholic University of America, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Colorado at Boulder, the University of Leicester, U.K., the University of New Hampshire, and Penn State University. Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Related TermsGoddard Space Flight CenterHeliophysicsHeliophysics DivisionIonosphereScience & ResearchSounding RocketsSounding Rockets Program View the full article

4 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) An astronaut aboard the International Space Station photographed wildfire smoke from Nova Scotia billowing over the Atlantic Ocean in May 2023. Warm weather and lack of rain fueled blazes across Canada last year, burning 5% of the country’s forests.NASA Extreme wildfires like these will continue to have a large impact on global climate. Stoked by Canada’s warmest and driest conditions in decades, extreme forest fires in 2023 released about 640 million metric tons of carbon, NASA scientists have found. That’s comparable in magnitude to the annual fossil fuel emissions of a large industrialized nation. NASA funded the study as part of its ongoing mission to understand our changing planet. The research team used satellite observations and advanced computing to quantify the carbon emissions of the fires, which burned an area roughly the size of North Dakota from May to September 2023. The new study, published on Aug. 28 in the journal Nature, was led by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Carbon monoxide from Canada wildfires curls thousands of miles across North America in this animation showing data from summer 2023. Lower concentrations are shown in purple; higher concentrations are in yellow. Red triangles indicate fire hotspots.NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center They found that the Canadian fires released more carbon in five months than Russia or Japan emitted from fossil fuels in all of 2022 (about 480 million and 291 million metric tons, respectively). While the carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted from both wildfires and fossil fuel combustion cause extra warming immediately, there’s an important distinction, the scientists noted. As the forest regrows, the amount of carbon emitted from fires will be reabsorbed by Earth’s ecosystems. The CO2 emitted from the burning of fossil fuels is not readily offset by any natural processes. An ESA (European Space Agency) instrument designed to measure air pollution observed the fire plumes over Canada. The TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument, or TROPOMI, flies aboard the Sentinel 5P satellite, which has been orbiting Earth since 2017. TROPOMI has four spectrometers that measure and map trace gases and fine particles (aerosols) in the atmosphere. The scientists started with the end result of the fires: the amount of carbon monoxide (CO) in the atmosphere during the fire season. Then they “back-calculated” how large the emissions must have been to produce that amount of CO. They were able to estimate how much CO2 was released based on ratios between the two gases in the fire plumes. “What we found was that the fire emissions were bigger than anything in the record for Canada,” said Brendan Byrne, a JPL scientist and lead author of the new study. “We wanted to understand why.” Warmest Conditions Since at Least 1980 Wildfire is essential to the health of forests, clearing undergrowth and brush and making way for new plant life. In recent decades, however, the number, severity, and overall size of wildfires have increased, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Contributing factors include extended drought, past fire management strategies, invasive species, and the spread of residential communities into formerly less developed areas. To explain why Canada’s fire season was so intense in 2023, the authors of the new study cited tinderbox conditions across its forests. Climate data revealed the warmest and driest fire season since at least 1980. Temperatures in the northwest part of the country — where 61% of fire emissions occurred — were more than 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit (2.6 degrees Celsius) above average from May through September. Precipitation was also more than 3 inches (8 centimeters) below average for much of the year. Driven in large part by these conditions, many of the fires grew to enormous sizes. The fires were also unusually widespread, charring some 18 million hectares of forest from British Columbia in the west to Quebec and the Atlantic provinces in the east. The area of land that burned was more than eight times the 40-year average and accounted for 5% of Canadian forests. “Some climate models project that the temperatures we experienced last year will become the norm by the 2050s,” Byrne said. “The warming, coupled with lack of moisture, is likely to trigger fire activity in the future.” If events like the 2023 Canadian forest fires become more typical, they could impact global climate. That’s because Canada’s vast forests compose one of the planet’s important carbon sinks, meaning that they absorb more CO2 from the atmosphere than they release. The scientists said that it remains to be seen whether Canadian forests will continue to absorb carbon at a rapid rate or whether increasing fire activity could offset some of the uptake, diminishing the forests’ capacity to forestall climate warming. News Media Contacts Jane J. Lee / Andrew Wang Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 818-354-0307 / 626-379-6874 jane.j.lee@jpl.nasa.gov / andrew.wang@jpl.nasa.gov Written by Sally Younger 2024-113 Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Related TermsEarthClimate ChangeEarth ScienceWater on Earth Explore More 3 min read Eclipse Soundscapes AudioMoth Donations Will Study Nature at Night During the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse, approximately 770 AudioMoth recording devices were used… Article 45 mins ago 9 min read Looking Back on Looking Up: The 2024 Total Solar Eclipse Introduction First as a bite, then a half Moon, until crescent-shaped shadows dance through the… Article 6 days ago 3 min read Entrepreneurs Challenge Prize Winner Uses Artificial Intelligence to Identify Methane Emissions The NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD) instituted the Entrepreneurs Challenge to identify innovative ideas and… Article 1 week ago Keep Exploring Discover Related Topics Missions Humans in Space Climate Change Solar System View the full article

Learn Home Eclipse Soundscapes AudioMoth… Audio Overview Learning Resources Science Activation Teams SME Map Opportunities More Science Stories Science Activation Highlights Citizen Science 3 min read Eclipse Soundscapes AudioMoth Donations Will Study Nature at Night During the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse, approximately 770 AudioMoth recording devices were used to capture sound data as part of the Eclipse Soundscapes Project — a multisensory participatory science (also known as “citizen science”) project that is studying how eclipses impact life on Earth. Following the eclipse, participants had the option to keep or send back their AudioMoth device for donation. Fifty-two AudioMoths were sent back to Eclipse Soundscapes (ES) so that ES could donate them to projects or communities for future scientific usage. Eighteen of those AudioMoths have been donated to Dark Sky Missouri, an initiative to protect our night skies and the creatures that depend on them. On Wednesday, August 21, 2024, at 3 p.m. EST, Eclipse Soundscapes hosted a webinar with Dark Sky Missouri founder Don Ficken to learn more about how these AudioMoths will contribute to future participatory science. Don Ficken is a Missouri Master Naturalist and amateur astronomer who found the Eclipse Soundscapes Project through SciStarter, an organization that helps bring together millions of curious and concerned people in the world to engage in real-world research questions through citizen science. He participated as a Data Collector in 2024. “[The Eclipse Soundscapes Project] opened up a door for me because I never really thought about sound acoustics in this way,” Ficken said. It occurred to Ficken that acoustics could help bolster Dark Sky Missouri’s efforts to study and conserve night time wildlife. One of these efforts, Lights Out Heartland, encourages homeowners and businesses to minimize artificial light usage in order to protect migrating birds from collisions due to disorienting bright lights. Ficken hopes to use the AudioMoths to capture the birds’ nocturnal flight calls as they fly over locations like the Gateway Arch, Shaw Nature Reserve, and Missouri Botanical Gardens. Dark Sky Missouri also hopes to take more general surveys of nature at night by placing AudioMoths in parks and natural areas. Even though parks are not typically open or staffed at night, the AudioMoths could help map the locations and movements of wildlife, creating talking points and learning opportunities for staff and visitors alike. Both initiatives will be piloted during the fall bird migration, with the goal of developing a framework for an expanded long term project. While there are no opportunities for the general public to get involved in the projects just yet, Ficken says participatory scientists can benefit from the multisensory methods employed in the Eclipse Soundscapes Project. “I think that the thing that they should think about is really the door that acoustics would be opening for them,” he said. “In other words, you don’t have to just visually look at daytime. Think about sound. Think about night.” For more information on how Dark Sky Missouri will use the AudioMoth recorders, read the Eclipse Soundscapes blog post. The Eclipse Soundscapes Project is supported by NASA under cooperative agreement award number 80NSSC21M0008 and is part of NASA’s Science Activation Portfolio. Learn more about how Science Activation connects NASA science experts, real content, and experiences with community leaders to do science in ways that activate minds and promote deeper understanding of our world and beyond: https://science.nasa.gov/learn Dark Sky Missouri will use the donated Eclipse Soundscapes AudioMoths to study bird calls and behavior at night. Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Editor NASA Science Editorial Team Related Terms 2024 Solar Eclipse Astrophysics Audio Citizen Science Earth Science Heliophysics Planetary Science Science Activation Explore More 2 min read Hubble Traces Star Formation in a Nearby Nebula Article 2 hours ago 2 min read Hubble Pinpoints a Dim, Starry Mini-galaxy Article 1 day ago 5 min read Webb Finds Early Galaxies Weren’t Too Big for Their Britches After All Article 2 days ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA James Webb Space Telescope Webb is the premier observatory of the next decade, serving thousands of astronomers worldwide. It studies every phase in the… Perseverance Rover This rover and its aerial sidekick were assigned to study the geology of Mars and seek signs of ancient microbial… Parker Solar Probe On a mission to “touch the Sun,” NASA’s Parker Solar Probe became the first spacecraft to fly through the corona… Juno NASA’s Juno spacecraft entered orbit around Jupiter in 2016, the first explorer to peer below the planet’s dense clouds to… View the full article

2 min read Hubble Traces Star Formation in a Nearby Nebula NASA, ESA, and L. C. Johnson (Northwestern University); Image Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America) NGC 261 blooms a brilliant ruby red against a myriad of stars in this new image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Discovered on Sept. 5, 1826 by Scottish astronomer James Dunlop, this nebula is located in one of the Milky Way’s closest galactic companions, the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). The ionized gas blazing from within this diffuse region marks NGC 261 as an emission nebula. It is home to numerous stars hot enough to irradiate surrounding hydrogen gas, causing the cloud to emit a pinkish-red glow. This inset image shows the location of NGC 261 within the Small Magellanic Cloud. NASA, ESA, L. C. Johnson (Northwestern University), and ESO/VISTA VMC; Image Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America) Hubble turned its keen eye toward NGC 261 to investigate how efficiently stars form in molecular clouds, which are extremely dense and compact regions of gas and dust. These clouds often consist of large amounts of molecular hydrogen — cold areas where most stars form. However, measuring this raw fuel of star formation in stellar nurseries is a challenge because molecular hydrogen doesn’t radiate easily. Since it is difficult to detect, scientists instead trace other molecules present in the molecular clouds. The SMC hosts a gas-rich environment of young stars along with trace amounts of carbon monoxide (CO), a chemical correlated with hydrogen and often used to identify the presence of such clouds. Using the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) and Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), Hubble imaged these stars in the southwest portion of the SMC where NGC 261 resides. The combined power of ACS and WFC3 allowed scientists to closely examine the nebula’s star-forming properties through its CO content at optical and near-infrared wavelengths. This research helps astronomers better understand how stars form in our home galaxy and others in our galactic neighborhood. Download Image Explore More Hubble’s Galaxies Facebook logo @NASAHubble @NASAHubble Instagram logo @NASAHubble Media Contact: Claire Andreoli NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD claire.andreoli@nasa.gov Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Editor Michelle Belleville Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms Astrophysics Galaxies Goddard Space Flight Center Hubble Space Telescope Stars Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Hubble Space Telescope Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe. Hubble Science Hubble’s Galaxies Stars 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 More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions The Solar System The Sun Mercury Venus Earth The Moon Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune Pluto & Dwarf Planets Asteroids, Comets & Meteors The Kuiper Belt The Oort Cloud 3 min read Sols 4287-4288: Back on the Road This image was taken by Mast Camera (Mastcam) aboard NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity on Sol 4284 — Martian day 4,284 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission — on Aug. 24, 2024, at 20:32:43 UTC. NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS Earth planning date: Monday, Aug. 26, 2024 Today’s planning day was a good example of how our team comes together to make quick decisions based on new information and science priorities. The original intent of today’s plan was to perform contact science on some interesting bright-toned rubbly rocks in our workspace, seen in the image above. These rocks were just a short bump away from the location of our last sampling campaign and the team had been eyeing them for a few weeks, interested in the details of their composition from the APXS instrument and their morphology from MAHLI. However, before we ever unstow our robotic arm to perform these types of observations, our Rover Planners and Surface Property Scientists perform a “Slip Risk Assessment.” This assessment is used to determine whether the rover’s wheels are stable on the ground so that we can safely unstow the heavy robotic arm and place the arm-mounted instruments very close to the surface. In today’s case, the team determined that it was not safe to unstow our arm. If the science team was interested in observing the bright-toned rocks in our workspace, it would require adjusting the rover’s position and performing the observations in the next planning cycle, impacting our overall mission timeline. With this information on hand, the science team had an excellent discussion, quickly assessing the pros and cons of sticking around with a small adjustment to get contact science at this location in our next plan, or continuing down the road to our next waypoint. I always enjoy listening to these discussions; they are led by our Long-Term Planners and provide the opportunity for all science advocates to voice their opinions. In today’s case, the science team decided to move along. This location had been opportunistic to begin with and more juicy science targets are certainly to come. Time is a precious resource to us, and we often consider the timeline cost of any given science observation, weighing the relative science benefit to the cost of planning cycles. So given this reworking of priorities, today’s two-sol plan was adjusted to include targeted science on the first sol before driving away towards our next waypoint, followed by another sol with untargeted science. Our drive takes us about 25 meters north and we’ll pause part way through the drive to take Mastcam imaging of some bright nodular-appearing rocks to examine their relationship to other rock types. Between the two sols of this plan, we’ll perform an empty-cell analysis of the CheMin cell used for our last sampling campaign, to determine if we have dumped all the sample out of it for future use with another sampling campaign. As always, we performed our normal environmental monitoring observations. Onward, Curiosity! Written by Elena Amador-French, Science Operations Coordinator at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory Share Details Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Related Terms Blogs Explore More 3 min read Perseverance Kicks off the Crater Rim Campaign! Perseverance is officially headed into a new phase of scientific investigation on the Jezero Crater… Article 11 hours ago 4 min read Sols 4284–4286: Environmental Science Extravaganza Article 2 days ago 3 min read Sols 4282-4283: Bumping Away from Kings Canyon Article 2 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

Mars: Perseverance (Mars 2020) Perseverance Home Mission Overview Rover Components Mars Rock Samples Where is Perseverance? Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Mission Updates Science Overview Objectives Instruments Highlights Exploration Goals News and Features Multimedia Perseverance Raw Images Images Videos Audio More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions The Solar System The Sun Mercury Venus Earth The Moon Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune Pluto & Dwarf Planets Asteroids, Comets & Meteors The Kuiper Belt The Oort Cloud 3 min read Perseverance Kicks off the Crater Rim Campaign! Mastcam-Z mosaic made of 59 individual Mastcam-Z images showing the area Perseverance will climb in the coming weeks on its way to Dox Castle, the rover’s first stop on the crater rim. NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS Perseverance is officially headed into a new phase of scientific investigation on the Jezero Crater rim! For the last 2 months, the Perseverance rover has been exploring the Neretva Vallis region of Jezero Crater, where rocks with interesting popcorn-like textures and “leopard spot” patterns have fascinated us all. Now, the rover has begun its long ascent up the crater rim, and is officially kicking off a new phase of exploration for the mission. Strategic (longer-term) planning is particularly important for the Mars 2020 mission given the crucial role Perseverance plays in collecting samples for Mars Sample Return, and the Mars 2020 team undertakes this planning in the form of campaigns. Perseverance has now completed four such campaigns— the Crater Floor, Delta Front, Upper Fan and Margin Unit campaigns respectively— making the Crater Rim Campaign next in line. Given its broad scope and the wide diversity of rocks we expect to encounter and sample along the way, it may be the most ambitious campaign the team has attempted so far. The team also has less information from orbiter data to go on compared to previous campaigns, because this area of the crater rim does not have the high-resolution, hyperspectral imaging of CRISM that helped inform much of our geological unit distinctions inside the crater. This means that Mastcam-Z multispectral and SuperCam long-distance imaging will be particularly useful for understanding broadscale mineralogical distinctions between rocks as we traverse the crater rim. Such imaging has already proved extremely useful in the Neretva Vallis area, where at Alsap Butte we observed rocks that appeared similar to each other in initial imaging, but actually display an Andy-Warhol-esque array of color in multispectral products, indicative of varied mineral signatures. Our next stop is Dox Castle where Perseverance will investigate the contact between the Margin Unit and the Crater rim, as well as rubbly material that may be our first encounter with deposits generated during the impact that created Jezero crater itself. Later in the campaign, we will investigate other light-toned outcrops that may or may not be similar to those encountered at Bright Angel, as well as rocks thought to be part of the regionally extensive olivine-carbonate-bearing unit, and whose relationship to both Séítah and the Margin Unit remains an interesting story to unravel. Throughout this next phase of exploration, comparing and contrasting the rocks we see on the rim to both each other and those previously explored in the mission will be an important part of our scientific investigations. The whole Mars 2020 science team is incredibly excited to be embarking on the next phase of Perseverance’s adventure, and we expect these results, and the samples we collect along the way, to inform our understanding of not just Jezero itself, but the planet Mars as a whole. We can’t wait to share what we find! Written by Eleni Ravanis, PhD Candidate and Graduate Research Assistant at University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Share Details Last Updated Aug 27, 2024 Related Terms Blogs Explore More 4 min read Sols 4284–4286: Environmental Science Extravaganza Article 1 day ago 3 min read Sols 4282-4283: Bumping Away from Kings Canyon Article 1 day ago 2 min read Sols 4280-4281: Last Call at Kings Canyon Article 1 week 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

The Pegasus Dwarf spheroidal galaxy, also known as Andromeda VI, is one of at least 13 dwarf galaxies that orbit the Andromeda galaxy.NASA, ESA, and D. Weisz (University of California – Berkeley); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America) A glittering collection of stars shines against a background of much more distant galaxies in this view from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope of the Pegasus Dwarf spheroidal galaxy, also known as Andromeda VI. The Andromeda galaxy, also known as Messier 31, is the Milky Way’s closest grand spiral galaxy neighbor, and is host to at least 13 dwarf galaxies that orbit around it. The Pegasus Dwarf spheroidal galaxy is one of these mini-galaxies. Dwarf spheroidal galaxies are the dimmest and least massive galaxies known. They tend to have elliptical shapes and relatively smooth distributions of stars. Dwarf spheroidal galaxies are usually devoid of gas and dominated by old and intermediate-age stars, although some have experienced small amounts of recent star formation. The Pegasus Dwarf Spheroidal galaxy was discovered in 1998 and has been characterized as having a small amount of heavy elements and little of the gas needed to form another generation of stars ― though more than many of the dwarf spheroidal galaxies within our Local Group of galaxies. Researchers suspect that Andromeda’s gravitational field may have stripped the star-forming gases from it, leaving a dearth of material to build more than a few generations of stars. In comparison, some of the dwarf spheroidal companion galaxies of the Milky Way found at comparable distances do contain some intermediate-age stars, but this could be because Andromeda is so massive and extended that its gravitational effects extend farther. The jury is still out on how dwarf spheroidal galaxies form. Theories include collisions between galaxies that break off small fragments, the gravitational influence of larger galaxies on small disk-shaped dwarf galaxies, and processes associated with the birth of small systems among collections of dark matter. Andromeda and the Milky Way are the only galaxies close enough for astronomers to view these dim satellite galaxies, so clues to their formation will have to come from close neighbors like this one. Hubble studied this galaxy as part of an examination of the entire Andromeda system of satellites in order to investigate such critical matters as dark matter, reionization, and the growth of galactic ecosystems across cosmic time. Media Contact: Claire Andreoli NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD claire.andreoli@nasa.gov View the full article

NASA is preparing space at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida for upcoming assembly activities of the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket core stage for future Artemis missions, beginning with Artemis III. Teams are currently outfitting the assembly building’s High Bay 2 for future vertical assembly of the rocket stage that will help power NASA’s Artemis campaign to the Moon. During Apollo, High Bay 2, one of four high bays inside the Vehicle Assembly Building, was used to stack the Saturn V rocket. During the Space Shuttle Program, the high bay was used for external tank checkout and storage and as a contingency storage area for the shuttle. Technicians are building tooling in High Bay 2 at NASA Kennedy that will allow NASA and Boeing, the SLS core stage lead contractor, to vertically integrate the core stage. NASA Michigan-based Futuramic is constructing the tooling that will hold the core stage in a vertical position, allowing NASA and Boeing, the SLS core stage lead contractor, to integrate the SLS rocket’s engine section and four RS-25 engines to finish assembly of the rocket stage. Vertical integration will streamline final production efforts, offering technicians 360-degree access to the stage both internally and externally. “The High Bay 2 area at NASA Kennedy is critical for work as SLS transitions from a developmental to operational model,” said Chad Bryant, deputy manager of the SLS Stages Office. “While teams are stacking and preparing the SLS rocket for launch of one Artemis mission, the SLS core stage for another Artemis mission will be taking shape just across the aisleway.” Under the new assembly model beginning with Artemis III, all the major structures for the SLS core stage will continue to be fully produced and manufactured at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans. Upon completion of manufacturing and thermal protection system application, the engine section will be shipped to NASA Kennedy for final outfitting. Later, the top sections of the core stage – the forward skirt, intertank, liquid oxygen tank, and liquid hydrogen tank – will be outfitted and joined at NASA Michoud and shipped to NASA Kennedy for final assembly. The fully assembled core stage for Artemis II arrived at Kennedy on July 23. NASA’s Pegasus barge delivered the SLS engine section for Artemis III to Kennedy in December 2022. Teams at NASA Michoud are outfitting the remaining core stage elements and preparing to horizontally join them. The four RS-25 engines for the Artemis III mission are complete at NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, and will be transported to NASA Kennedy in 2025. Major core stage and exploration upper stage structures are in work at NASA Michoud for Artemis IV and beyond. NASA is working to land the first woman, first person of color, and its first international partner astronaut on the Moon under Artemis. SLS is part of NASA’s backbone for deep space exploration, along with the Orion spacecraft, supporting ground systems, advanced spacesuits and rovers, the Gateway in orbit around the Moon, and commercial human landing systems. SLS is the only rocket that can send Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single launch. News Media Contact Jonathan Deal Marshall Space Flight Center Huntsville, Ala. 256-544-0034 View the full article

5 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) NASA’s Europa Clipper is seen here on Aug. 21 at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Engineers and technicians deployed and tested the giant solar arrays to be sure they will operate in flight.NASA/Frank Michaux The largest spacecraft NASA has ever built for planetary exploration just got its ‘wings’ — massive solar arrays to power it on the journey to Jupiter’s icy moon Europa. NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft recently got outfitted with a set of enormous solar arrays at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Each measuring about 46½ feet (14.2 meters) long and about 13½ feet (4.1 meters) high, the arrays are the biggest NASA has ever developed for a planetary mission. They have to be large so they can soak up as much sunlight as possible during the spacecraft’s investigation of Jupiter’s moon Europa, which is five times farther from the Sun than Earth is. The arrays have been folded up and secured against the spacecraft’s main body for launch, but when they’re deployed in space, Europa Clipper will span more than 100 feet (30.5 meters) — a few feet longer than a professional basketball court. The “wings,” as the engineers call them, are so big that they could only be opened one at a time in the clean room of Kennedy’s Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility, where teams are readying the spacecraft for its launch period, which opens Oct. 10. Watch as engineers and technicians deploy and test Europa Clipper’s massive solar arrays in a clean room at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/KSC/APL/Airbus Flying in Deep Space Meanwhile, engineers continue to assess tests conducted on the radiation hardiness of transistors on the spacecraft. Longevity is key, because the spacecraft will journey more than five years to arrive at the Jupiter system in 2030. As it orbits the gas giant, the probe will fly by Europa multiple times, using a suite of science instruments to find out whether the ocean underneath its ice shell has conditions that could support life. Powering those flybys in a region of the solar system that receives only 3% to 4% of the sunlight Earth gets, each solar array is composed of five panels. Designed and built at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, and Airbus in Leiden, Netherlands, they are much more sensitive than the type of solar arrays used on homes, and the highly efficient spacecraft will make the most of the power they generate. At Jupiter, Europa Clipper’s arrays will together provide roughly 700 watts of electricity, about what a small microwave oven or a coffee maker needs to operate. On the spacecraft, batteries will store the power to run all of the electronics, a full payload of science instruments, communications equipment, the computer, and an entire propulsion system that includes 24 engines. NASA’s Europa Clipper is seen here on Aug. 21 in a clean room at Kennedy Space Center after engineers and technicians tested and stowed the spacecraft’s giant solar arrays.NASA/Frank Michaux While doing all of that, the arrays must operate in extreme cold. The hardware’s temperature will plunge to minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 240 degrees Celsius) when in Jupiter’s shadow. To ensure that the panels can operate in those extremes, engineers tested them in a specialized cryogenic chamber at Liège Space Center in Belgium. “The spacecraft is cozy. It has heaters and an active thermal loop, which keep it in a much more normal temperature range,” said APL’s Taejoo Lee, the solar array product delivery manager. “But the solar arrays are exposed to the vacuum of space without any heaters. They’re completely passive, so whatever the environment is, those are the temperatures they get.” About 90 minutes after launch, the arrays will unfurl from their folded position over the course of about 40 minutes. About two weeks later, six antennas affixed to the arrays will also deploy to their full size. The antennas belong to the radar instrument, which will search for water within and beneath the moon’s thick ice shell, and they are enormous, unfolding to a length of 57.7 feet (17.6 meters), perpendicular to the arrays. This artist’s concept depicts NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft in orbit around Jupiter. The mission’s launch period opens Oct. 10. NASA/JPL-Caltech “At the beginning of the project, we really thought it would be nearly impossible to develop a solar array strong enough to hold these gigantic antennas,” Lee said. “It was difficult, but the team brought a lot of creativity to the challenge, and we figured it out.” More About the Mission Europa Clipper’s three main science objectives are to determine the thickness of the moon’s icy shell and its interactions with the ocean below, to investigate its composition, and to characterize its geology. The mission’s detailed exploration of Europa will help scientists better understand the astrobiological potential for habitable worlds beyond our planet. Managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory leads the development of the Europa Clipper mission in partnership with APL for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. APL designed the main spacecraft body in collaboration with JPL and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, and Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. The Planetary Missions Program Office at Marshall executes program management of the Europa Clipper mission. NASA’s Launch Services Program, based at Kennedy, manages the launch service for the Europa Clipper spacecraft, which will launch on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy. Find more information about Europa here: europa.nasa.gov News Media Contacts Gretchen McCartney Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 818-393-6215 gretchen.p.mccartney@jpl.nasa.gov Karen Fox / Alana Johnson NASA Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1600 / 202-358-1501 karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / alana.r.johnson@nasa.gov 2024-112 Share Details Last Updated Aug 27, 2024 Related TermsEuropa ClipperEuropaJet Propulsion LaboratoryJupiterJupiter MoonsThe Solar System Explore More 14 min read The Making of Our Alien Earth: The Undersea Volcanoes of Santorini, Greece The following expedition marks the third installment of NASA Astrobiology’s fieldwork series, the newly rebranded… Article 3 days ago 5 min read NASA Shares Asteroid Bennu Sample in Exchange with JAXA Article 4 days ago 2 min read Gateway: Energizing Exploration Discover the cutting-edge technology powering Gateway, humanity's first lunar space station. Article 5 days ago Keep Exploring Discover Related Topics Missions Humans in Space Climate Change Solar System /wp-content/plugins/nasa-blocks/assets/images/media/media-example-01.jpgThis landscape of “mountains” and “valleys” speckled with glittering stars is actually the edge of a nearby, young, star-forming region called NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula. Captured in infrared light by NASA’s new James Webb Space Telescope, this image reveals for the first time previously invisible areas of star birth.NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI /wp-content/plugins/nasa-blocks/assets/images/media/media-example-01.jpgThis landscape of “mountains” and “valleys” speckled with glittering stars is actually the edge of a nearby, young, star-forming region called NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula. Captured in infrared light by NASA’s new James Webb Space Telescope, this image reveals for the first time previously invisible areas of star birth.NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI /wp-content/plugins/nasa-blocks/assets/images/media/media-example-01.jpgThis landscape of “mountains” and “valleys” speckled with glittering stars is actually the edge of a nearby, young, star-forming region called NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula. Captured in infrared light by NASA’s new James Webb Space Telescope, this image reveals for the first time previously invisible areas of star birth.NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScIView the full article

On Aug. 27, 1984, President Ronald W. Reagan announced the Teacher in Space project as part of NASA’s Space Flight Participant Program to expand the space shuttle experience to a wider set of private citizens who would communicate the experience to the public. From 11,000 teacher applicants, each of the 50 states and territories selected two nominees for a total of 114. After meeting with each candidate, a review panel narrowed the field down to 10 finalists. These 10 underwent interviews and medical examinations. A senior review panel recommended S. Christa McAuliffe as the prime Teacher in Space to fly with the STS-51L crew, with Barbara R. Morgan as her backup. Tragically, the Jan. 28, 1986, Challenger accident prevented McAuliffe from realizing her dreams of teaching from space. Left: President Ronald W. Reagan announces the Teacher in Space project in 1984.Middle: NASA Administrator James M. Beggs. Right: Official emblem of the Teacher in Space project. During a ceremony at the Department of Education recognizing outstanding public secondary schools, President Reagan announced the Teacher in Space project, saying, It’s long been a goal of our space shuttle to someday carry private citizens in space. Until now, we hadn’t decided who the first citizen passenger would be. But today, I’m directing NASA to begin a search in all of our elementary and secondary schools, and to choose as the first citizen passenger in the history of our space program, one of America’s finest – a teacher. When that shuttle takes off, all of America will be reminded of the crucial role that teachers and education play in the life of our nation. Later that day, NASA Administrator James M. Beggs held a news conference at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C., and provided more details, saying that although a teacher would lead off the Space Flight Participant Program, future selections would include journalists, poets, and artists. NASA released an Announcement of Opportunity on Nov. 8 detailing the requirements for teacher applicants and setting the target launch date of early 1986. From the approximately 11,000 applications received by the Feb. 1, 1985, deadline, the Council of Chief State School Officers coordinated the selection process, working with state, territorial, and agency review panels. On May 3, they announced the 114 nominees, two from each U.S. state, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, Departments of Defense and State overseas schools, and Bureau of Indian Affairs schools. The nominees attended a workshop in Washington, D.C., June 22-27 focused on space education, because even those not selected planned to serve as space ambassadors for NASA. Each nominee met with the National Review Panel that selected the 10 finalists, announced on July 1. Left: The 10 Teacher in Space finalists during their visit to NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston in July 1985. Middle: As part of their orientation, the 10 finalists toured JSC’s space shuttle mockups. Right: The 10 finalists experienced brief periods of weightlessness aboard NASA’s KC-135 aircraft. The 10 finalists spent the week of July 7 at NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston. During the week, the finalists underwent medical and psychological examinations, toured JSC’s facilities, and experienced episodes of weightlessness on the KC-135 aircraft. Following a brief stop at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, the finalists spent July 15-17 in Washington, D.C., undergoing a series of interviews with the NASA Space Flight Participant Committee, who recommended the Teacher in Space candidate and a backup to NASA Administrator Beggs. Left: Vice President George H.W. Bush announces the prime, S. Christa McAuliffe, and backup, Barbara R. Morgan, Teacher in Space candidates. Right: McAuliffe addresses the assembled crowd. On July 19, the 10 finalists assembled in the Roosevelt Room at the White House. Following Administrator Beggs’ introductory remarks, Vice President George H.W. Bush announced the Teacher in Space winners – S. Christa McAuliffe, a high school social studies teacher from Concord, New Hampshire, and her backup, Barbara R. Morgan, a second-grade teacher from McCall, Idaho. The other eight finalists continued to participate in the project by helping to develop McAuliffe’s lesson plans. Left: Barbara R. Morgan, second from left, and S. Christa McAuliffe, fourth from left, meet the STS-51L crew at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. Middle: McAuliffe, left, and Morgan get their first taste of space food. Right: Morgan, left, and McAuliffe receive a briefing on the space shuttle galley. McAuliffe and Morgan reported to JSC on Sept. 9, 1985, to begin training for their space shuttle mission. Assigned to STS-51L scheduled for January 1986, they met their fellow crewmates Commander Francis R. “Dick” Scobee, Pilot Michael J. Smith, and Mission Specialists Ellison S. Onizuka, Judith A. Resnik, and Ronald E. McNair. Gregory B. Jarvis, a Hughes Aircraft engineer, joined the crew as a second payload specialist in October. Their first week, McAuliffe and Morgan received basic orientation, including fitting for their flight suits and tasting space food. For the next four months, they trained with the rest of the crew on shuttle systems, emergency evacuation drills, and completed flights aboard T-38 jets and the KC-135 weightless aircraft. Left: The STS-51L crew receives a briefing on crew escape procedures. Middle: The STS-51L crew receives a briefing on water evacuation. Right: Barbara R. Morgan, left, and S. Christa McAuliffe pose in front of the space shuttle crew compartment trainer. Left: At Houston’s Ellington Air Force Base, Barbara R. Morgan, Michael J. Smith, a photographer, S. Christa McAuliffe, and Francis R. “Dick” Scobee walk onto the tarmac toward T-38 jet trainers. Right: McAuliffe in the backseat of a T-38 prior to takeoff. Left: Teacher in Space designee S. Christa McAuliffe in the backseat of a T-38 jet trainer during a right turn, with part of Galveston Island visible at left. Right: Michael J. Smith, left, Barbara R. Morgan, McAuliffe, and Francis R. “Dick” Scobee following training flights aboard T-38 jets. Left: Backup Teacher in Space Barbara R. Morgan, left, prime Teacher in Space S. Christa McAuliffe, Payload Specialist Gregory B. Jarvis, and Mission Specialist Ronald E. McNair in the middeck of the Shuttle Mission Simulator. Right: Teacher in Space McAuliffe, second from left, and her backup Morgan, get a taste of weightlessness aboard NASA’s KC-135, along with STS-61C Payload Specialist Congressman C. William “Bill” Nelson, now serving as NASA’s 14th administrator. Training aboard the KC-135 for Teacher in Space demonstrations. Left: Hydroponics in Microgravity. Middle left: Molecular Mixing Experiment. Middle right: Magnetic Effects. Right: Leapfrog in Microgravity – not an actual experiment. During her flight, McAuliffe planned to conduct two live lessons from space and record film for six demonstrations. The first lesson, “The Ultimate Field Trip,” sought to allow students to compare daily life aboard the shuttle versus on Earth. The second lesson, “Where We’ve Been, Where We’re Going, Why?” would explain the reasons for exploring space and making use of its unique environment for manufacturing certain products. The six filmed demonstrations included topics such as magnetism, Newton’s Laws, effervescence, simple machines and tools, hydroponics, and chromatographic separation, and how each of these behaves in weightlessness. Since McAuliffe could not complete these activities, many years later astronauts aboard the space station completed her mission by filming the demonstrations and preparing classroom lessons. Left: At NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Teacher in Space S. Christa McAuliffe watches the launch of space shuttle Challenger on the STS-61A Spacelab D1 mission. Middle: The STS-51L crew answer reporters’ questions following the Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test (TCDT). Right: During the TCDT, the crew practices emergency evacuation procedures. To prepare for the upcoming launch, McAuliffe and Morgan traveled to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida to witness the liftoff of the STS-61A Spacelab D1 mission, the last flight of space shuttle Challenger before STS-51L, on Oct. 30. The entire STS-51L crew returned to Florida for the Jan. 8, 1986, Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test (TCDT), essentially a dress rehearsal for the actual countdown to launch, planned for two weeks later. As part of the TCDT, the astronauts practiced evacuations drills from the shuttle in case of a fire or other emergency. After the test, they returned to Houston to complete last-minute training. Left: The STS-51L crew arrives at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida a few days before launch. Middle: The STS-51L crew at the traditional prelaunch breakfast. Right: The STS-51L astronauts leave crew quarters on their way to Launch Pad 39B. On Jan. 23, the STS-51L crew arrived at KSC for the launch set for Jan. 26. Bad weather caused a one-day delay, and the crew suited up, rode out to the pad, and boarded Challenger. A problem closing the hatch followed by poor weather caused a scrub of the launch attempt. On Jan. 28, the crew went back out to the pad in unusually cold weather for Florida and took their places aboard Challenger. This time, the launch took place on time. Left: The official photograph of the STS-51L crew. Right: The STS-51L crew patch, with an apple representing S. Christa McAuliffe and the Teacher in Space project. Following the Challenger accident, the Teacher in Space project remained active for a time as NASA reevaluated the entire Space Flight Participant Program. Morgan assumed the role of Teacher in Space designee for a few months, returning to Idaho in the fall of 1986 to resume her teaching duties, yet maintained her contact with NASA. In 1990, NASA canceled the Teacher in Space project. Left: Official portrait of Barbara R. Morgan following her selection as a NASA astronaut in 1998. Middle: In 2004, NASA selected Educator Astronauts Dorothy “Dottie” M. Metcalf-Lindenburger, left, Richard “Ricky” R. Arnold, and Joseph “Joe” M. Acaba as members of the Group 19 astronauts. Right: Emblem of the Year of Education on Station. In 1998, NASA invited Morgan to join the next astronaut selection group, not as a teacher but as a full-fledged mission specialist, eligible for multiple flights. That same year, NASA initiated its Educator Astronaut program, in which the agency selected qualified teachers as full-time astronauts instead of payload specialists. Morgan reported for training with the rest of the Group 17 astronauts in August 1998. In 2002, NASA assigned her to the STS-118 space station assembly mission that, following delays caused by the Columbia accident, flew in August 2007 aboard Endeavour, Challenger’s replacement. In 2004, NASA selected its first Educator Astronauts as part of Group 19 – Joseph “Joe” M. Acaba, Richard R. “Rickey” Arnold, and Dorothy “Dottie” M. Metcalf-Lindenburger. Metcalf-Lindenburger flew as a mission specialist aboard the STS-131 space station assembly flight in April 2010. Acaba and Arnold flew together on STS-119 in March 2009. Acaba went on to spend 125 days aboard the space station as an Expedition 31 and 32 flight engineer between May and September 2012, and another 168 days during Expedition 53 and 54 between September 2017 and February 2018. He has served as chief of the astronaut office since February 2023. Arnold made his second flight as a flight engineer during Expedition 55 and 56 from March to October 2018. Between their nearly back-to-back missions, Acaba and Arnold spent the 2017-18 school year aboard the space station for A Year of Education on Station. As a tribute to McAuliffe and her legacy, they completed her mission, filming her demonstrations and developing corresponding lessons for classrooms. 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For every NASA astronaut who serves as a public face of human spaceflight, there are thousands of people working behind the scenes to make the agency’s missions a success. Even the smallest tasks impact NASA’s ability to explore and innovate for the benefit of humanity. The team of administrative assistants and secretaries who work at the Johnson Space Center in Houston are acutely aware of this fact. Whether they are coordinating meetings, arranging travel, or preparing materials and information for Johnson’s leaders, this team of over 90 individuals takes pride in providing critical support for the agency’s programs and managers. “We work hand-in-hand with management to get them where they need to go and ensure they have what they need to continue doing their important work,” said Carla Burnett, an executive assistant in the Center Director’s Office who is also the lead for all of Johnson’s administrative staff. Carla Burnett participates in NASA’s celebration of the 60th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s historic Moon speech, held at Rice Stadium in Houston on Sept. 12, 2022. Image courtesy of Carla Burnett Burnett has turned her long-standing passion for administrative work into a 41-year career at Johnson. She was just a youngster when she started working in the Astronaut Office mailroom – an opportunity that came through her high school’s Office Education Program. “Being a meek and mild high school student, sitting there with the astronauts, going through all of their fan mail – I was in awe! It was an absolute honor,” she said. That experience and earning recognition as her high school’s Office Education Student of the Year confirmed for Burnett that administrative work was the right career path for her. She said that fidelity and perseverance launched her from the Astronaut Office mailroom to a position as a crew secretary for two space shuttle flights. “Being a servant and helping others is what I really love about administrative work,” she said. Today, Burnett supports Johnson’s senior executives and serves as a central resource for the rest of the administrative team. “They are all very self-sufficient and work within their own organizations,” she explained, but she may coordinate team-wide meetings, celebrations, or trainings, and she is always available to help answer questions. “We work consistently as a cohesive team. We are knowledgeable and, may I add, exceptional at what we do because we do it for the benefit and success of our Johnson family, NASA, and a plethora of communities!” Burnett’s dedication to service is reflected across the administrative team, as is a commitment to caring for others. Edwina Gaines, administrative assistant for the Extravehicular Activity and Human Surface Mobility Program, said that being an instrument of team success and the opportunity to build long-lasting friendships are the most rewarding parts of her job. “That connection to people is important,” she said. “It’s important for me to know who I’m supporting or working with.” Edwina Gaines snaps a selfie during a professional development event for administrative professionals in 2023. Gaines joined the Johnson team as a contractor nearly 20 years ago thanks to an opportunity that arose from her volunteer work at church. A church partner, the Houston Area Urban League, was helping a NASA subcontractor fill a secretarial position through the Small Business Administration’s HUBZone Program. Gaines got the job. Since then, she has supported four programs and two institutional organizations, getting to know several agency leaders quite well. Gaines said she paid attention to little details – like which managers preferred printed materials over presentations, how they organized their offices, and when they typically stopped for coffee or something to eat – and worked to stay one step ahead of them. She recalled one occasion when she realized a manager had not taken a break in five hours and brought her something to drink. “It’s about taking care of the people who are doing the mission. If you don’t take care of yourself, you can’t complete the mission,” she said. Rick Pettis, the administrative officer for the Center Operations Directorate, appreciates being part of a great team. Pettis has worked at Johnson since 2014, when he retired from the U.S. Navy after 23 years. “I enjoy helping people with problem solving,” he said. “Every day there will be someone who calls me to ask, ‘How do I get this done?’” Rick Pettis poses with a spacesuit display.Image courtesy of Rick Pettis The administrative team’s work involves other highlights, as well. “When I met my first astronaut, I was in awe,” said Dottie Workman, a secretary supporting Johnson’s External Relations Office. “I couldn’t believe that someone so important was walking around the campus just like everyone else. He was so nice – he shook my hand and took the time to talk to me.” Workman has been a civil servant for 52 years and 29 of those have been spent at Johnson. “My career has taken me all over the United States and Germany,” she said. “When my son was in the military and stationed at Ft. Sam Houston in San Antonio he said, ‘Mom, why don’t you move to Texas?’ I didn’t have a good reason to say no, so here I am!” Dottie Workman met J.J. Watt, former professional football player with the Houston Texans, during his visit to Johnson Space Center. Image courtesy of Dottie Workman. Outside of meeting and interacting with astronauts, Workman said being able to share NASA with her family and friends is her favorite part of working at Johnson. “It is always exciting to see their reaction,” she said. Burnett is thankful for a united team that understands the value of their work. “I’m grateful to work with a group of professionals who know the significance of propelling today’s men and women into the next generation of deep space for years to come,” she said. “We are Artemis proud!” View the full article