A Tour Of Our Moon

Solar System: Things to Know  This Week

This week, we’re looking at MAVEN’s exploration of Mars, the Orionid meteor showers, Mercury’s “great valley” and more.

1. Celebrating MAVEN

MAVEN, the Mars Atmospheric and Volatile Evolution, was the second mission selected for our Mars Scout program and the first to explore the planet’s upper atmosphere . It launched on November 18, 2013 and entered orbit around Mars on September 21, 2014. 

+ MAVEN Quick Facts

2. Jupiter Moon Dance

This time-lapse sequence of Hubble Space Telescope images shows Jupiter’s moon Europa as it moved across the planet’s face over the course of 19 minutes. Europa is at the bottom center on Jupiter's disk, the Great Red Spot to the left and Europa's shadow to its right. The video was created by combining six snapshots taken in ultraviolet light with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3.

+ Learn more

3. The Orionid Meteor Shower

Orionid shower peaks November 28. Look for the constellation Orion in the Southeast sky by 9 p.m. Using binoculars, look for the Orion Nebula. 

4. Comet Warming Up!! 

Comet 45P/Honda-Mrkos-Pajdu áková will brighten to expected stunning binocular visibility in mid to late December, but is near Venus on November 23rd.

+ Track the Comet

5. Mercury’s "Great Valley"

A newly discovered "great valley" in the southern hemisphere of Mercury provides more evidence that the planet closest to the sun is shrinking. Using stereo images from our MESSENGER spacecraft to create a high-resolution map, scientists have discovered that revealed the broad valley -- more than 620 miles (1,000 kilometers) long -- extending into the Rembrandt basin, one of the largest and youngest impact basins on Mercury. About 250 miles (400 kilometers) wide and 2 miles (3 kilometers) deep, Mercury's great valley is smaller than Mars' Valles Marineris, but larger than North America's Grand Canyon and wider and deeper than the Great Rift Valley in East Africa.

+ Learn more

Discover the full list of 10 things to know about our solar system this week HERE.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Have a Happy Halloween with NASA

Attention ghouls and goblins of the galaxy! The season for scares and frights is upon us, so we’ve rounded up a few Halloween resources to capture that festive feeling. Read on for craft ideas, free decoration downloads, a creepy soundtrack, and even costume ideas.

Overdid it at the pumpkin patch this year? Get some creative inspiration and some pumpkin-building tips from our Jet Propulsion Laboratory engineers, carve a James Webb Space Pumpkin, or paint a pumpkin with space and weather themed designs. And yes – you can make a NASA pumpkin, too.

Speaking of design, check out our terrifying Galaxy of Horrors posters: decorate your walls with a an illustration of a galactic graveyard or of dark energy prowling through the universe…

If costumes are more your thing, see how the astronauts aboard the International Space Station have dressed up over the years.

Finally, our Sinister Sounds of the Solar System playlist will give you just the right soundtrack for a haunted house or a party – or for scaring yourself all alone.

Eclipse Across America

August 21, 2017, the United States experienced a solar eclipse! 

An eclipse occurs when the Moon temporarily blocks the light from the Sun. Within the narrow, 60- to 70-mile-wide band stretching from Oregon to South Carolina called the path of totality, the Moon completely blocked out the Sun’s face; elsewhere in North America, the Moon covered only a part of the star, leaving a crescent-shaped Sun visible in the sky.

During this exciting event, we were collecting your images and reactions online. 

Here are a few images of this celestial event...take a look:

This composite image, made from 4 frames, shows the International Space Station, with a crew of six onboard, as it transits the Sun at roughly five miles per second during a partial solar eclipse from, Northern Cascades National Park in Washington. Onboard as part of Expedition 52 are: NASA astronauts Peggy Whitson, Jack Fischer, and Randy Bresnik; Russian cosmonauts Fyodor Yurchikhin and Sergey Ryazanskiy; and ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Paolo Nespoli.

Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

The Bailey's Beads effect is seen as the moon makes its final move over the sun during the total solar eclipse on Monday, August 21, 2017 above Madras, Oregon.

Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani

This image from one of our Twitter followers shows the eclipse through tree leaves as crescent shaped shadows from Seattle, WA.

Credit: Logan Johnson

“The eclipse in the palm of my hand”. The eclipse is seen here through an indirect method, known as a pinhole projector, by one of our followers on social media from Arlington, TX.

Credit: Mark Schnyder

Through the lens on a pair of solar filter glasses, a social media follower captures the partial eclipse from Norridgewock, ME.

Credit: Mikayla Chase

While most of us watched the eclipse from Earth, six humans had the opportunity to view the event from 250 miles above on the International Space Station. European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Paolo Nespoli captured this image of the Moon’s shadow crossing America.

Credit: Paolo Nespoli

This composite image shows the progression of a partial solar eclipse over Ross Lake, in Northern Cascades National Park, Washington. The beautiful series of the partially eclipsed sun shows the full spectrum of the event. 

Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

In this video captured at 1,500 frames per second with a high-speed camera, the International Space Station, with a crew of six onboard, is seen in silhouette as it transits the sun at roughly five miles per second during a partial solar eclipse, Monday, Aug. 21, 2017 near Banner, Wyoming.

Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky

To see more images from our NASA photographers, visit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasahqphoto/albums/72157685363271303

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

2016: This Year at NASA!

As 2016 comes to a close and prospects of the new year loom before us, we take a moment to look back at what we’ve accomplished and how it will set us ahead in the year to come.

2016 marked record-breaking progress in our exploration activities. We advanced the capabilities needed to travel farther into the solar system while increasing observations of our home and the universe, learning more about how to continuously live and work in space and, or course, inspiring the next generation of leaders to take up our journey to Mars and make their own discoveries.

Here are a few of the top NASA stories of 2016...

International Space Station

One Year Mission…completed!

NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko returned to Earth after spending a year in space. Testing the limits of human research, findings from their One Year Mission will help send humans farther into space than ever before.

Commercial Resupply

Commercial partners Orbital ATK and SpaceX delivered tons (yes literally tons) of cargo to the International Space Station. This cargo supported hundreds of science experiments and technology demonstrations crucial to our journey to Mars.

Mars

Expandable Habitats

The Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) was one of the technology demonstrations delivered to the space station in April. Expandable habitats greatly decrease the amount of transport volume for future space missions.

Booster Test Firing

In June, a booster for our Space Launch System (SLS) rocket successfully fired up. It will be used on the first un-crewed test flight of SLS with the Orion spacecraft in 2018. Eventually, this rocket and capsule will carry humans into deep space and one day…Mars!

InSight

This year we updated the milestones for our InSight mission with a new target launch window beginning in May 2018. This mission will place a fixed science outpost on Mars to study its deep interior. Findings and research from this project will address one of the most fundamental questions we have about the planetary and solar system science…how in the world did these rocky planets form?

Solar System and Beyond

Juno

On July 4, our Juno spacecraft arrived at Jupiter. This mission is working to improve our understanding of the solar system’s beginnings by revealing the origin and evolution of Jupiter.

OSIRIS-REx

In September, we launched our OSIRIS-REx spacecraft…which is America’s first-ever asteroid sample return mission. This spacecraft will travel to a near-Earth asteroid, called Bennu, where it will collect a sample to bring back to Earth for study.

James Webb Space Telescope

In February, the final primary mirror segment of our James Webb Space Telescope was installed. This will be the world’s most powerful space telescope ever, and is scheduled to launch in 2018. Webb will look back in time, studying the very first galaxies ever formed.

Kepler

In May, our Kepler mission verified the discovery of 1,284 new planets. Kepler is the first NASA mission to find potentially habitably Earth-sized planets.

Earth Right Now

Earth Expeditions

Our efforts to improve life on Earth included an announcement in March of a collection of Earth Science field campaigns to study how our planet is changing. These Earth Expeditions sent scientists to places like the edge of the Greenland ice sheet to the coral reefs of the South Pacific to delve into challenging questions about how our planet is changing…and what impacts humans are having on it.

Small Satellites

In November, we announced plans to launch six next-generation Earth-observing small satellite missions. One uses GPS signals to measure wind in hurricanes and tropical systems in greater detail than ever before.

Aeronautics Research

Our efforts in 2016 to make air travel cleaner, safer and quieter included new technology to improve safety and efficiency of aircraft arrivals, departures and service operations.

X-Plane

In June, we highlighted our first designation of an experimental airplane, or X-plane, in a decade. It will test new electric propulsion technology.

Drone Technolgy

In October, we evaluated a system being developed for the Federal Aviation Administration to safely manage drone air traffic.

Technology

Electric Propulsion

We selected Aerojet Rocketdyne to develop and advanced electric propulsion system to enable deep space travel to an asteroid and Mars.

Spinoffs

Our technology transfer program continued to share the agency’s technology with industry, academia and other government agencies at an unprecedented rate.

Centennial Challenges

Our Centennial Challenges program conducted four competition events in 2016 to spark innovation and enable solutions in important technology focus areas.

Watch the full video recap of ‘This Year @NASA’ here:

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Testing Time for the SLS Engine Section

In schools across the country, many students just finished final exams. Now, part of the world’s most powerful rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), is about to feel the pressure of testing time. The first SLS engine section has been moving slowly upriver from Michoud Assembly Facility near New Orleans, but once the barge Pegasus docks at our Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, the real strength test for the engine section will get started.

The engine section is the first of four of the major parts of the core stage that are being tested to make sure SLS is ready for the challenges of spaceflight.

The engine section is located at the bottom of the rocket. It has a couple of important jobs. It holds the four RS-25 liquid propellant engines, and it serves as one of two attach points for each of the twin solid propellant boosters. This first engine section will be used only for ground testing. 

Of all the major parts of the rocket, the engine section gets perhaps the roughest workout during launch. Millions of pounds of core stage are pushing down, while the engines are pushing up with millions of pounds of thrust, and the boosters are tugging at it from both sides. That’s a lot of stress. Maybe that’s why there’s a saying in the rocket business: “Test like you fly, and fly like you test.”

After it was welded at Michoud, technicians installed the thrust structure, engine supports and other internal equipment and loaded it aboard the Pegasus for shipment to Marshall.

Once used to transport space shuttle external tanks, Pegasus was modified for the longer SLS core stage by removing 115 feet out of the middle of the barge and added a new 165-foot section with a reinforced main deck. Now as long as a football field, Pegasus – with the help of two tugboats – will transport core stage test articles to Marshall Space Flight Center as well as completed core stages to Stennis Space Center in Mississippi for test firing and then to Kennedy Space Center for launch.

The test article has no engines, cabling, or computers, but it will replicate all the structures that will undergo the extreme physical forces of launch. The test article is more than 30 feet tall, and weighs about 70,000 pounds. About 3,200 sensors attached to the test article will measure the stress during 59 separate tests. Flight-like physical forces will be applied through simulators and adaptors standing in for the liquid hydrogen tank and RS-25 engines.

The test fixture that will surround and secure the engine section weighs about 1.5 million pounds and is taller than a 5-story building. Fifty-five big pistons called “load lines” will impart more than 4.5 million pounds of force vertically and more than 428,000 pounds from the side.

The engineers and their computer design tools say the engine section can handle the stress.  It’s the test team’s job prove that it can.

For more information about the powerful SLS rocket, check out: http://nasa.gov/SLS. 

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com/

What exactly did you do during your time as a flight surgeon? I guess im just trying to ask, what does that job include?

Curious about how to send research to the International Space Station or how to get involved with NASA missions as a college student? Ask our experts!

Through our Student Payload Opportunity with Citizen Science, or SPOCS, we’re funding five college teams to build experiments for the International Space Station. The students are currently building their experiments focusing on bacteria resistance or sustainability research. Soon, these experiments will head to space on a SpaceX cargo launch! University of Idaho SPOCS team lead Hannah Johnson and NASA STEM on Station activity manager Becky Kamas will be taking your questions in an Answer Time session on Thurs., June 3, from 12-1 p.m. EDT here on our Tumblr! Make sure to ask your question now by visiting http://nasa.tumblr.com/ask. Hannah Johnson recently graduated from the University of Idaho with a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering. She is the team lead for the university’s SPOCS team, Vandal Voyagers I, designing an experiment to test bacteria-resistant polymers in microgravity. Becky Kamas is the activity manager for STEM on Station at our Johnson Space Center in Houston. She helps connect students and educators to the International Space Station through a variety of opportunities, similar to the ones that sparked her interest in working for NASA when she was a high school student. Student Payload Opportunity with Citizen Science Fun Facts:

Our scientists and engineers work with SPOCS students as mentors, and mission managers from Nanoracks help them prepare their experiments for operation aboard the space station.

The Vandal Voyagers I team has nine student members, six of whom just graduated from the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering. Designing the experiment served as a senior capstone project.

The experiment tests polymer coatings on an aluminum 6061 substrate used for handles on the space station. These handles are used every day by astronauts to move throughout the space station and to hold themselves in place with their feet while they work.

The University of Idaho’s SPOCS project website includes regular project updates showing the process they followed while designing and testing the experiment.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.

Solar System: 10 Things to Know This Week...Halloween Edition!

This week, we're getting into the Halloween spirit with 10 spooktacular things to let your imagination run wild. 

It's not Halloween without our favorite scary characters, but what if they could stop bothering us Earthlings and go far, far away? We begin with where Dracula, Frankenstein, and other creepy creatures might choose to live if the galaxy were theirs to claim...

1. The dark (k)night.

The prince of darkness himself, Dracula, can finally seek sweet respite from the Sun. We think he'd love to live on a rocky planet named YZ Ceti d that orbits so close to its red star that it's tidally locked keeping one side of the planet in perpetual nighttime and the other side in perpetual daytime, with a brilliant red sky (though we can guess which side Dracula will prefer). 

2. Where art thou, werewolves? 

Home sweet home for our furry Full Moon friends might just be on Trappist-1, a planetary system with seven planets—and where standing on one planet would mean the other planets look like six moons (some as big as our Moon in the sky). 

3. Left in the dust. 

We couldn't think of anyone better to live on Proxima b than The Mummy. Hopefully this ancient monster can finally rest in peace on an exoplanet that scientists theorize is a desert planet once home to ancient oceans. 

4. Cloudy with a chance of Frankenstein.

One scientific experiment we'd like to conduct: whether Frankenstein would rather live on HAT-P-11b or Kepler-3b, theorized to have fierce thunderstorms and lightning. 

5. The walking dead. 

We're pretty confident that if zombies were to pick a planet, they'd want one that shares their love of death and destruction. We think they'd feel right at home on one of the pulsar planets, which are scorched by radiation because they orbit a dead star. 

6. Rest your weary bones. 

Skeletons need look no further: Osiris, an exoplanet that's so close to a star that it's "losing its flesh" as the star destroys it, seems like a perfect match. 

7. Enough of the scary stuff. 

For kids out there, turn pumpkin decorating into an out-of-this-world activity with space-themed stencils, from Saturn to the Sun. 

8. Spooky sounds. 

Cassini's radio emissions from Saturn could give creaky doors and howling winds a run for their money. Listen to the eerie audio recordings here and find more HERE.

9. Pumpkin-carve like a NASA engineer. 

NASA engineers design and build robots that can fly millions of miles to study other planets for a living—so on Halloween, they can't help but bring that creative thinking to the grand old tradition of pumpkin carving. Take a cue from their creations with these insider tips.

10. Detective for a day. 

From blades of ice on Pluto to a fuzzy, white "bunny" photographed on Mars, become a solar system sleuth and see if you can solve the stellar mysteries in this slideshow (then compare with how scientists cracked the case). 

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.

These three towers are only a small portion of the massive Eagle Nebula.

Known as the “Pillars of Creation,” the beautiful tendrils of cosmic dust and gas are giving birth to new stars, buried within their spires. This iconic image only shows a stretch of about four or five light-years … while the whole nebula itself spans about 70 by 55 light-years.

Learn more about Hubble’s celebration of Nebula November and see new nebula images, here.

You can also keep up with Hubble on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Flickr!

Image credits: NASA, ESA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

Hello there 👋

Welcome back to Mindful Mondays! 🧘

Mondays are, famously, most people’s seventh favorite day of the week. And Mondays where everything is darker, longer, and colder than normal? Thanks, but no thanks.

But don’t panic; we’ve got something to help. It might be small, but it can make a big difference. Just ten minutes of mindfulness can go a long way, and taking some time out to sit down, slow down, and breathe can help center your thoughts and balance your mood. Sometimes, the best things in life really are free.

This year, we have teamed up with the good folks at @nasa. They want you to tune in and space out to relaxing music and ultra-high-definition visuals of the cosmos—from the surface of Mars.  

Sounds good, right? Well, it gets better. Watch more Space Out episodes on NASA+, a new no-cost, ad-free streaming service.

Why not give it a try? Just a few minutes this Monday morning can make all the difference, and we are bringing mindfulness straight to you. 

🧘WATCH: Space Out with NASA: Martian Landscapes, 11/27 at 1pm EST🧘

YouTube

Space Out with NASA: Martian Landscapes

Explore the surface of Mars as you turn on, tune in, and space out to relaxing music and stunning ultra-high-definition visuals of our cosmi