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By NASA
NASA’s SPHEREx is situated on a work stand ahead of prelaunch operations at the Astrotech Processing Facility at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. The SPHEREx space telescope will share its ride to space on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with NASA’s PUNCH mission.
Credit: USSF 30th Space Wing/Christopher
NASA will provide live coverage of prelaunch and launch activities for SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer), the agency’s newest space telescope. This will lift off with another NASA mission, Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere, or PUNCH, which will study the Sun’s solar wind.
The launch window opens at 10:09 p.m. EST (7:09 p.m. PST) Thursday, Feb. 27, for the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that will lift off from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Watch coverage on NASA+. Learn how to watch NASA content through a variety of platforms, including social media.
The SPHEREx mission will improve our understanding of how the universe evolved and search for key ingredients for life in our galaxy.
The four small spacecraft that comprise PUNCH will observe the Sun’s corona as it transitions into solar wind.
The deadline for media accreditation for in-person coverage of this launch has passed. NASA’s media credentialing policy is available online. For questions about media accreditation, please email: ksc-media-accreditat@mail.nasa.gov.
NASA’s mission coverage is as follows (all times Eastern and subject to change based on real-time operations):
Tuesday, Feb. 25
2 p.m. – SPHEREx and PUNCH Science Overview News Conference
Shawn Domagal-Goldman, acting director, Astrophysics Division, NASA Headquarters Joe Westlake, director, Heliophysics Division, NASA Headquarters Nicholeen Viall, PUNCH Mission Scientist, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Rachel Akeson, SPHEREx science data center lead, Caltech/IPAC Phil Korngut, SPHEREx instrument scientist, Caltech The news conference will stream on NASA+. Media may ask questions in person or via phone. Limited auditorium space will be available for in-person participation. For the dial-in number and passcode, media should contact the NASA Kennedy newsroom no later than one hour before the start of the event at ksc-newsroom@mail.nasa.gov.
Wednesday, Feb. 26
3:30 p.m. – SPHEREx and PUNCH Prelaunch News Conference
Mark Clampin, acting deputy associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters David Cheney, PUNCH program executive, NASA Headquarters James Fanson, SPHEREx project manager, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory Denton Gibson, launch director, NASA’s Launch Services Program Julianna Scheiman, director, NASA Science Missions, SpaceX U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Ina Park, 30th Operations Support Squadron launch weather officer Coverage of the prelaunch news conference will stream live on NASA+.
Media may ask questions in person and via phone. Limited auditorium space will be available for in-person participation. For the dial-in number and passcode, media should contact the Kennedy newsroom no later than one hour before the start of the event at ksc-newsroom@mail.nasa.gov.
Thursday, Feb. 27
12 p.m. – SPHEREx and PUNCH Launch Preview will stream live on NASA+.
9:15 p.m. – Launch coverage begins on NASA+.
10:09 p.m. – Launch window opens.
Audio Only Coverage
Audio only of the launch coverage will be carried on the NASA “V” circuits, which may be accessed by dialing 321-867-1220, or -1240. On launch day, “mission audio,” countdown activities without NASA+ media launch commentary, will be carried on 321-867-7135.
NASA Website Launch Coverage
Launch day coverage of the mission will be available on the agency’s website. Coverage will include links to live streaming and blog updates beginning no earlier than 9:15 p.m., Feb. 27, as the countdown milestones occur. On-demand streaming video and photos of the launch will be available shortly after liftoff.
For questions about countdown coverage, contact the Kennedy newsroom at 321-867-2468. Follow countdown coverage on the SPHEREx blog.
Attend the Launch Virtually
Members of the public can register to attend this launch virtually. NASA’s virtual guest program for this mission also includes curated launch resources, notifications about related opportunities or changes, and a stamp for the NASA virtual guest passport following launch.
Watch, Engage on Social Media
You can also stay connected by following and tagging these accounts:
X: @NASA, @NASAJPL, @NASAUnivese, @NASASun, @NASAKennedy, @NASA_LSP
Facebook: NASA, NASAJPL, NASA Universe, NASASunScience, NASA’s Launch Services Program
Instagram: @NASA, @NASAKennedy, @NASAJPL, @NASAUnivese
For more information about these missions, visit:
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/spherex/
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/punch/
-end-
Alise Fisher – SPHEREx
Headquarters, Washington
202-617-4977
alise.m.fisher@nasa.gov
Sarah Frazier – PUNCH
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
202-853-7191
sarah.frazier@nasa.gov
Laura Aguiar
Kennedy Space Center, Florida
321-593-6245
laura.aquiar@nasa.gov
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Last Updated Feb 18, 2025 LocationNASA Headquarters Related Terms
SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe and Ices Explorer) Missions Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere (PUNCH) Science Mission Directorate View the full article
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By NASA
5 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
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NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover captured these drifting noctilucent, or twilight, clouds in a 16-minute recording on Jan. 17. (This looping clip has been speeded up about 480 times.) The white plumes falling out of the clouds are carbon dioxide ice that would evaporate closer to the Martian surface.NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS/SSI While the Martian clouds may look like the kind seen in Earth’s skies, they include frozen carbon dioxide, or dry ice.
Red-and-green-tinted clouds drift through the Martian sky in a new set of images captured by NASA’s Curiosity rover using its Mastcam — its main set of “eyes.” Taken over 16 minutes on Jan. 17 (the 4,426th Martian day, or sol, of Curiosity’s mission), the images show the latest observations of what are called noctilucent (Latin for “night shining”), or twilight clouds, tinged with color by scattering light from the setting Sun.
Sometimes these clouds even create a rainbow of colors, producing iridescent, or “mother-of-pearl” clouds. Too faint to be seen in daylight, they’re only visible when the clouds are especially high and evening has fallen.
Martian clouds are made of either water ice or, at higher altitudes and lower temperatures, carbon dioxide ice. (Mars’ atmosphere is more than 95% carbon dioxide.) The latter are the only kind of clouds observed at Mars producing iridescence, and they can be seen near the top of the new images at an altitude of around 37 to 50 miles (60 to 80 kilometers). They’re also visible as white plumes falling through the atmosphere, traveling as low as 31 miles (50 kilometers) above the surface before evaporating because of rising temperatures. Appearing briefly at the bottom of the images are water-ice clouds traveling in the opposite direction roughly 31 miles (50 kilometers) above the rover.
Dawn of Twilight Clouds
Twilight clouds were first seen on Mars by NASA’s Pathfinder mission in 1997; Curiosity didn’t spot them until 2019, when it acquired its first-ever images of iridescence in the clouds. This is the fourth Mars year the rover has observed the phenomenon, which occurs during early fall in the southern hemisphere.
Mark Lemmon, an atmospheric scientist with the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado, led a paper summarizing Curiosity’s first two seasons of twilight cloud observations, which published late last year in Geophysical Research Letters. “I’ll always remember the first time I saw those iridescent clouds and was sure at first it was some color artifact,” he said. “Now it’s become so predictable that we can plan our shots in advance; the clouds show up at exactly the same time of year.”
Each sighting is an opportunity to learn more about the particle size and growth rate in Martian clouds. That, in turn, provides more information about the planet’s atmosphere.
Cloud Mystery
One big mystery is why twilight clouds made of carbon dioxide ice haven’t been spotted in other locations on Mars. Curiosity, which landed in 2012, is on Mount Sharp in Gale Crater, just south of the Martian equator. Pathfinder landed in Ares Vallis, north of the equator. NASA’s Perseverance rover, located in the northern hemisphere’s Jezero Crater, hasn’t seen any carbon dioxide ice twilight clouds since its 2021 landing. Lemmon and others suspect that certain regions of Mars may be predisposed to forming them.
A possible source of the clouds could be gravity waves, he said, which can cool the atmosphere: “Carbon dioxide was not expected to be condensing into ice here, so something is cooling it to the point that it could happen. But Martian gravity waves are not fully understood and we’re not entirely sure what is causing twilight clouds to form in one place but not another.”
Mastcam’s Partial View
The new twilight clouds appear framed in a partially open circle. That’s because they were taken using one of Mastcam’s two color cameras: the left 34 mm focal length Mastcam, which has a filter wheel that is stuck between positions. Curiosity’s team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California remains able to use both this camera and the higher-resolution right 100 mm focal length camera for color imaging.
The rover recently wrapped an investigation of a place called Gediz Vallis channel and is on its way to a new location that includes boxwork — fractures formed by groundwater that look like giant spiderwebs when viewed from space.
More recently, Curiosity visited an impact crater nicknamed “Rustic Canyon,” capturing it in images and studying the composition of rocks around it. The crater, 67 feet (20 meters) in diameter, is shallow and has lost much of its rim to erosion, indicating that it likely formed many millions of years ago. One reason Curiosity’s science team studies craters is because the cratering process can unearth long-buried materials that may have better preserved organic molecules than rocks exposed to radiation at the surface. These molecules provide a window into the ancient Martian environment and how it could have supported microbial life billions of years ago, if any ever formed on the Red Planet.
More About Curiosity
Curiosity was built by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California. JPL leads the mission on behalf of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego built and operates Mastcam.
For more about Curiosity, visit:
science.nasa.gov/mission/msl-curiosity
News Media Contacts
Andrew Good
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-2433
andrew.c.good@jpl.nasa.gov
Karen Fox / Molly Wasser
NASA Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / molly.l.wasser@nasa.gov
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Last Updated Feb 11, 2025 Related Terms
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5 min read NASA-Led Study Pinpoints Areas Sinking, Rising Along California Coast
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By NASA
“I’m hopeful anyone, regardless of their scientific background, could read a Hubble post and understand the gist of it and be interested in it,” said Elizabeth Tammi, social media lead for the Hubble Space Telescope. “I also read our stories with the eye of the potential audience member: What are they going to care about? What is going to bring them into this story? What is going to make them want to read more?”Credits: Courtesy of Elizabeth Tammi Name: Elizabeth Tammi
Title: Hubble Space Telescope Social Media Lead
Formal Job Classification: Communications Specialist
Organization: Hubble Space Telescope Operations (Code 441)
What do you do and what is most interesting about your role here at Goddard? How do you help support Goddard’s mission?
I am the social media lead for the Hubble Space Telescope mission at Goddard. In short, Hubble is an orbiting observatory that’s been in low-Earth orbit for more than 30 years. It’s one of NASA’s flagship missions, probably one of its most iconic missions. Hubble has shaped our understanding of how we imagine the universe — visually how we think about it.
I run Hubble’s Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Flickr, along with various other multimedia and communications tasks. We’re a very close-knit team, so we collaborate a lot, both within our team, and with other missions across the agency as well.
I’m primarily focused on social media and figuring out how are we going to share our news. On any given day, I might also be working on a script, editing news releases, or working with other accounts on social media campaigns. It’s different every day, which I really like.
What is your educational background?
I went to Mercer University, which is in Macon, Georgia. I graduated in 2020 with a degree in journalism and creative writing. There, they have a great program called the Center for Collaborative Journalism, which allowed us to work in newsrooms for academic credit. That was really useful, especially in this field, getting that hands-on experience and getting published from my freshman year on. I was eventually able to intern at Goddard the summer before my senior year. I really don’t think that would have been possible if I hadn’t had the audio production experience that Mercer allowed me to get, along with just all aspects of journalism, media, and communications.
“Hubble is one of NASA’s flagship missions, probably one of its most iconic missions,” said Elizabeth Tammi, social media lead for the Hubble Space Telescope. “Hubble has shaped our understanding of how we imagine the universe — visually how we think about it.”Credits: Courtesy of Elizabeth Tammi How does your writing experience contribute to your role with Hubble?
I know how to write accessibly and in a straightforward manner. I’m hopeful anyone, regardless of their scientific background, could read a post and understand the gist of it and be interested in it. That’s the goal. I try to come up with interesting turns of phrase when I can. I also read our stories with the eye of the potential audience member: What are they going to care about? What is going to bring them into this story? What is going to make them want to read more?
Outside work, you’ve written and published books. What inspired you to decide to write?
There’s not a day I can remember where I wasn’t absolutely infatuated with books. I think my parents read to me long before I could even understand them. It was just always such a huge part of my life — and I loved, loved, loved reading. When I realized that actual people wrote books, then I knew I wanted to write. To be clear, I didn’t take real steps toward that until I was about 15, 16-ish years old, because I guess in my mind, I still had this idea that authors were more than human.
I’ve since had two novels published. Both are in the fantasy genre and earned complimentary reviews; my second novel even earned a Moonbeam Children’s Book Award.
“I know it can be intimidating, to think about NASA as a place to intern,” said Hubble Space Telescope social media lead Elizabeth Tammi. “If you have any interest in space, I think that’s the most important part: People who are passionate and interested in our space program.”Credits: Courtesy of Elizabeth Tammi What do you most enjoy about sharing the Hubble story?
I think my favorite part is reading the comments that we get from the public, just because everyone has been so supportive of the telescope. Social media can put on display the best and worst aspects of humanity. It’s very nice to see this supportive corner of the Internet.
So far, what I’ve really enjoyed was our “Deep Field Week” social media campaign, which was around the 25th anniversary of the Hubble Deep Field image . To the unaided eye, this was a seemingly empty patch of sky. Hubble revealed it has countless galaxies. It was a really staggering finding and definitely was a huge cultural shift in how we think about our universe.
Previously, you were a NASA intern from the Summer of 2019 to May 2020. How has that experience shaped your current role?
It was absolutely vital. I don’t think I would be here in this position without that internship experience. It was the summer before my senior year of college. I got to go up to Goddard for summer 2019 and I was working primarily as an audio production intern, though the internship afforded me the opportunity to contribute to the newsroom’s work overall.
I worked with Katie Atkinson, who I also went to college with, and we got to work on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission. One of my primary tasks that summer was working on an oral history campaign tied to Apollo 11’s 50th anniversary . We encouraged people from all over to send in audio accounts of what they remember experiencing when Apollo 11 landed on the Moon in 1969. Or, if they didn’t remember seeing it as it happened, how did the landing affect them and their view of the world, or their career aspirations, or if they have family stories tied to Apollo.
If I could describe my NASA experience with a book title, it would be the term “Galaxy Brain.” It’s when you have a normal thought but then you think harder, and it gets bigger. From the idea of constantly feeling mind-blown by the work that’s going on around me to being part of it makes me feel, “Oh my gosh!” This “Galaxy Brain” imagery symbolizes the enormous magnitude of everything that is interesting and mysterious. It’s just something that’s constantly engaging.
Conversations With Goddard is a collection of Q&A profiles highlighting the breadth and depth of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center’s talented and diverse workforce. The Conversations have been published twice a month on average since May 2011. Read past editions on Goddard’s “Our People” webpage.
By Elissa Fielding
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
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By NASA
“I’m always proud every time I see a new picture taken by Hubble,u0022 said Phathom Donald, a satellite systems engineer for the Hubble Space Telescope. u0022It feels like an accomplishment and an honor even to be part of a mission that brings those images to people on Earth.”u003cstrongu003eu003cemu003eCredits: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center / Rob Andreoliu003c/emu003eu003c/strongu003e Name: Phathom Donald
Title: Mission Engineer
Formal Job Classification: Satellite Systems Engineer
Organization: Astrophysics Project Division, Hubble Space Telescope Operations Project, Code 441
What do you do and what is most interesting about your role here at Goddard? How do you help support Goddard’s mission?
As a member of the flight operations team for the Hubble Space Telescope, I monitor and evaluate the performance of Hubble’s subsystems through its telemetry. I send commands to Hubble as needed for routine maintenance, maintaining communication with the spacecraft, and recovery from onboard anomalies. I also support ground system maintenance to ensure that operations run smoothly and uninterrupted.
On the flight software team, I build and run simulations to verify flight software changes before they’re installed onto Hubble. Just like how your laptop or your smartphone gets regular updates to add new features or to fix bugs, Hubble gets flight software updates for added capabilities and to address new issues.
Being a flight controller was a dream of mine, so being able to command a spacecraft has been really exciting. I also really enjoy coding, and it’s been interesting seeing how all these critical and complicated activities happen at the same time. I think the work I do outside of my flight controller role has helped me become a better flight controller, because I have a better idea of what’s happening behind the scenes — things feel a bit more intuitive to me.
How did you find your path to Goddard?
During undergrad, I was on a path to become a power systems engineer. But one day in my senior design class, our professor invited the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) project manager at the time to speak to our class about systems engineering and its applications to the mission. Within five minutes of this presentation, I was on the verge of tears. This presentation alone changed the course of my career because it reminded me that I love the stars and I love space. More importantly, it made me feel like a career at NASA was actually possible.
So, I emailed the speaker and asked him for advice, and he responded with excellent guidance and encouragement. I saved that email and essentially used it as a career guide. After graduating, I worked for a NASA contractor first as a quality engineer, then as a model-based systems engineer. While I was in that role, I pursued my master’s, and about a month after graduating, I saw the job posting for Hubble’s flight operations team at Goddard. After a year or so of settling in, I reached out to that same speaker and I let him know I took his advice, I made it to NASA, and that I couldn’t be more grateful for his help. He responded beautifully, saying that he was humbled to have played any role in me getting to where I wanted to be.
What first sparked your interest in space?
My dad used to take my brothers and me to the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles all the time. I loved going to those shows in the planetarium and just feeling engrossed in what they were teaching. I’d always wanted to take an astronomy class, but I didn’t get the chance until my last year of undergrad. I’m so glad I did; it just reaffirmed that space is for me.
u0022In moments where Hubble’s mission is at risk, I’ll look at the situation and think, ‘Okay, what can we do to either fix or mitigate this problem?’u0022 said Phathom Donald, a satellite systems engineer for the Hubble Space Telescope. u0022I do what I can with care, I communicate clearly with those I’m working with, and I trust the abilities of my colleagues.”u003cstrongu003eu003cemu003eCredits: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center / Rebecca Rothu003c/emu003eu003c/strongu003e What is your educational background?
I graduated from Howard University in Washington, D.C., in 2014 with a bachelor’s in electrical engineering. I also have a master’s in space systems engineering from Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. Right now, I’m pursuing a graduate certificate in control systems from the University of Michigan at Dearborn to prepare for a role supporting Hubble’s pointing and control subsystems. After I’m done, I plan to pursue a graduate certificate in aerospace for that same reason; I want to pick up and hone skills in order to maximize my contributions to Hubble.
How do you keep a cool head when you have a mission-critical situation?
I think I’m generally a pretty calm person, but in moments where Hubble’s mission is at risk, I tend to focus on what is in my power to get done. So I’ll look at the situation and think, “OK, what can we do to either fix or mitigate this problem?” And I do what I can with care, I communicate clearly with those I’m working with, and I trust the abilities of my colleagues. I work with really brilliant, dedicated people who love what they do, so I know that they’re going to do what’s best for the mission.
What is your proudest accomplishment at Goddard?
To be honest, I’m always proud every time I see a new picture taken by Hubble, especially after we’ve recovered it from an anomaly. It feels like an accomplishment and an honor even to be part of a mission that brings those images to people on Earth.
Who are your science role models, and how have they shaped your career in science?
Katherine Johnson: she was an African American mathematician who was pivotal in the success of the early human spaceflight missions carried out by NASA. Her complex trajectory calculations got the first man into space and back unharmed. I also admire Dr. Sian Proctor: she was the first Black woman to pilot a spacecraft.
As a minority, it can be easy to feel like an outlier in the space industry. Seeing people like Katherine and Dr. Proctor succeed and excel in these fields adds a bit of comfort. They show me that these technically demanding roles are attainable.
How do you like to spend your time outside of work? What are your hobbies?
I spend a lot of time with my tiny dog, Chara. I named her after a yellow star in the Hunting Dogs constellation. Chara is Greek for “joy,” and to say she brings me joy would be an understatement.
I actually have a new obsession with snorkeling and freediving. I went snorkeling for the first time in early 2021 and it completely changed my life. Before snorkeling, I was terrified of water. After snorkeling, I wanted to be a fish. I just love the freedom that comes with the lack of equipment. I love the peace that I feel underwater.
What is your “six-word memoir”? A six-word memoir describes something in just six words.
“The stars are not too far.”
What is some advice you would give your 10-year-old self?
You are capable of more than you know, more than what people might try to make you believe. Do what makes you feel fulfilled and define your own success. Your passion is your strength.
By Hannah Richter
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
Conversations With Goddard is a collection of Q&A profiles highlighting the breadth and depth of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center’s talented and diverse workforce. The Conversations have been published twice a month on average since May 2011. Read past editions on Goddard’s “Our People” webpage.
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Last Updated Feb 10, 2025 Related Terms
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By NASA
The ring of light surrounding the center of the galaxy NGC 6505, captured by ESA’s Euclid telescope, is an example of an Einstein ring. NGC 6505 is acting as a gravitational lens, bending light from a galaxy far behind it. ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre, G. Anselmi, T. Li; CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO or ESA Standard Licence Euclid, an ESA (European Space Agency) mission with NASA contributions, has made a surprising discovery in our cosmic backyard: a phenomenon called an Einstein ring.
An Einstein ring is light from a distant galaxy bending to form a ring that appears aligned with a foreground object. The name honors Albert Einstein, whose general theory of relativity predicts that light will bend and brighten around objects in space.
In this way, particularly massive objects like galaxies and galaxy clusters serve as cosmic magnifying glasses, bringing even more distant objects into view. Scientists call this gravitational lensing.
Euclid Archive Scientist Bruno Altieri noticed a hint of an Einstein ring among images from the spacecraft’s early testing phase in September 2023.
“Even from that first observation, I could see it, but after Euclid made more observations of the area, we could see a perfect Einstein ring,” Altieri said. “For me, with a lifelong interest in gravitational lensing, that was amazing.”
The ring appears to encircle the center of a well-studied elliptical galaxy called NGC 6505, which is around 590 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Draco. That may sound far, but on the scale of the entire universe, NGC 6505 is close by. Thanks to Euclid’s high-resolution instruments, this is the first time that the ring of light surrounding the galaxy has been detected.
Light from a much more distant bright galaxy, some 4.42 billion light-years away, creates the ring in the image. Gravity distorted this light as it traveled toward us. This faraway galaxy hasn’t been observed before and doesn’t yet have a name.
“An Einstein ring is an example of strong gravitational lensing,” explained Conor O’Riordan, of the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, Germany, and lead author of the first scientific paper analyzing the ring. “All strong lenses are special, because they’re so rare, and they’re incredibly useful scientifically. This one is particularly special, because it’s so close to Earth and the alignment makes it very beautiful.”
Einstein rings are a rich laboratory for scientists to explore many mysteries of the universe. For example, an invisible form of matter called dark matter contributes to the bending of light into a ring, so this is an indirect way to study dark matter. Einstein rings are also relevant to the expansion of the universe because the space between us and these galaxies — both in the foreground and the background — is stretching. Scientists can also learn about the background galaxy itself.
“I find it very intriguing that this ring was observed within a well-known galaxy, which was first discovered in 1884,” said Valeria Pettorino, ESA Euclid project scientist. “The galaxy has been known to astronomers for a very long time. And yet this ring was never observed before. This demonstrates how powerful Euclid is, finding new things even in places we thought we knew well. This discovery is very encouraging for the future of the Euclid mission and demonstrates its fantastic capabilities.”
A close-up view of the center of the NGC 6505 galaxy, with the bright Einstein ring aligned with it, captured by ESA’s Euclid space telescope.ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre, G. Anselmi, T. Li; CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO or ESA Standard Licence By exploring how the universe has expanded and formed over its cosmic history, Euclid will reveal more about the role of gravity and the nature of dark energy and dark matter. Dark energy is the mysterious force that appears to be causing the universe’s expansion. The space telescope will map more than a third of the sky, observing billions of galaxies out to 10 billion light-years. It is expected to find around 100,000 strong gravitational lenses.
“Euclid is going to revolutionize the field with all this data we’ve never had before,” added O’Riordan.
Although finding this Einstein ring is an achievement, Euclid must look for a different, less visually obvious type of gravitational lensing called “weak lensing” to help fulfil its quest of understanding dark energy. In weak lensing, background galaxies appear only mildly stretched or displaced. To detect this effect, scientists will need to analyze billions of galaxies.
Euclid launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, July 1, 2023, and began its detailed survey of the sky Feb. 14, 2024. The mission is gradually creating the most extensive 3D map of the universe yet. The Einstein ring find so early in its mission indicates Euclid is on course to uncover many more secrets of the universe.
More About Euclid
Euclid is a European mission, built and operated by ESA, with contributions from NASA. The Euclid Consortium — consisting of more than 2,000 scientists from 300 institutes in 15 European countries, the United States, Canada, and Japan — is responsible for providing the scientific instruments and scientific data analysis. ESA selected Thales Alenia Space as prime contractor for the construction of the satellite and its service module, with Airbus Defence and Space chosen to develop the payload module, including the telescope. Euclid is a medium-class mission in ESA’s Cosmic Vision Programme.
Three NASA-supported science teams contribute to the Euclid mission. In addition to designing and fabricating the sensor-chip electronics for Euclid’s Near Infrared Spectrometer and Photometer (NISP) instrument, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory led the procurement and delivery of the NISP detectors as well. Those detectors, along with the sensor chip electronics, were tested at NASA’s Detector Characterization Lab at Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The Euclid NASA Science Center at IPAC (ENSCI), at Caltech in Pasadena, California, will archive the science data and support U.S.-based science investigations. JPL is a division of Caltech.
Media Contacts
Elizabeth Landau
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-0845
elandau@nasa.gov
Calla Cofield
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
626-808-2469
calla.e.cofield@jpl.nasa.gov
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