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How Small Is Too Small? Volunteers Help NASA Test Lake Monitoring From Space
2 min read
How Small Is Too Small? Volunteers Help NASA Test Lake Monitoring From Space Jen Oden, Snohomish County Water Quality Specialist, and Megan Lane, LOCSS team member, report a lake height measurement at Flowing Lake, Snohomish County, Washington. Visit locss.org to contact the team or to get involved!Grant Parkins, 2018Volunteers participating in the Lake Observations by Citizen Scientists and Satellites (LOCSS) project have been collecting water level data in lakes since 2017. Now, the LOCSS team has used these data to examine the accuracy of water level measurements made from space. The results, published in GIScience & Remote Sensing, showed that modern satellites with special instruments called nadir altimeters can capture water level variation with relatively high accuracy even for lakes smaller than one square kilometer. These measurements are crucial for scientific research and resource management.
“We can look at the wetland now with different eyes,” said Nelsi Durán, a volunteer from Ciénaga La Musanda, Colombia. (Translated from Spanish).
The work done by LOCSS volunteers also helped reveal where satellite-based lake water level measurements can go wrong. Water level variability turns out to be an important factor. Relatively small lakes with a high lake level variability can be measured from space, but lakes where the water level seldom changes yielded measurements with lower accuracy.
The LOCSS project has included 274 lakes in 10 countries (USA, Canada, Colombia, Chile, Kenya, Spain, France, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh), so far. Since the project started, more than 10,000 citizen scientists have reported water level measurements to the project.
“We chose to work with the LOCSS team, because it is important for us to try to widen our understanding of how our environments change over time,” said Dan Grigas, an ecologist at Forest Preserve District, DuPage County, Illinois. “This includes how changes in climate patterns in both the near-term and long-term can affect freshwater ecology. This program also allows for and relies on citizen scientists to participate, which strengthens the relationships among government agencies, the people they serve, and the environments that we all treasure.”
Are you passionate about understanding our planet and its precious water resources? Visit locss.org and look for a participating lake near you!
Take measurements of lake heights and surface areas to reveal how their water volumes are changing!
Facebook logo @nasascience_ @nasascience_ Instagram logo @nasascience_ Linkedin logo @nasascience_ Share Details Last Updated Dec 17, 2025 Related Terms Explore More 2 min read New Software from the Dynamic Eclipse Broadcast InitiativeEighty-two volunteer teams with the Dynamic Eclipse Broadcast (DEB) Initiative spent the day spread across…
Article 1 week ago 3 min read Eclipse Soundscapes Volunteers Empower Others to Get Involved in Scientific Discovery, Post-Eclipse Article 2 weeks ago 1 min read NASA is Grateful for Citizen ScientistsThis Thanksgiving, we’re grateful for you!
Article 3 weeks agoNASA JPL Shakes Things Up Testing Future Commercial Lunar Spacecraft
6 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video
A time-lapse video recorded at JPL in October shows engineers and technicians moving and attaching a full-scale model of Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lunar lander on top of two lunar orbiters. The full stack was then subjected to a vibration test that mimics the violent action of rocket launch.NASA/JPL-CaltechThe same historic facilities that some 50 years ago prepared NASA’s twin Voyager probes for their ongoing interstellar odyssey are helping to ready a towering commercial spacecraft for a journey to the Moon. Launches involve brutal shaking and astonishingly loud noises, and testing in these facilities mimics those conditions to help ensure mission hardware can survive the ordeal. The latest spacecraft to get this treatment are Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 2 vehicles, set to launch to the Moon’s far side next year.
The Environmental Test Laboratory at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California is where dozens of robotic spacecraft have been subjected to powerful jolts, extended rattling, high-decibel blasts of sound, and frigid and scorching temperatures, among other trials. Constructed in the 1960s and modernized over the years, the facilities have prepared every NASA spacecraft built or assembled at JPL for the rigors of space, from the Ranger spacecraft of the dawning Space Age to the Perseverance Mars rover to Europa Clipper, currently en route to the Jupiter system.
That legacy, and the decades of accumulated experience of the Environmental Test Laboratory team at JPL, is also supporting industry efforts to return to the Moon as part of NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative and its Artemis campaign, which will bring astronauts back to the lunar surface.
In recent months, a full-scale model of Firefly’s uncrewed Blue Ghost Mission 2 spacecraft was put through its paces by the experts in the lab’s vibration and acoustic testing facilities. Lessons learned with this model, called a structural qualification unit, will be applied to upcoming testing of the spacecraft that will fly to the Moon as early as 2026 through NASA’s CLPS.
“There’s a lot of knowledge gained over the years, passed from one generation of JPL engineers to another, that we bring to bear to support our own missions as well as commercial efforts,” said Michel William, a JPL engineer in the Environmental Test Laboratory who led the testing. “The little details that go into getting these tests right — nobody teaches you that in school, and it’s such a critical piece of space launch.”
Engineers and technicians secure a full-scale model of Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander atop the other spacecraft that make up the company’s second delivery to the lunar surface. Environmental testing for the spacecraft took place in a clean room at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in October. NASA/JPL-Caltech Testing just rightThe Environmental Test Laboratory team led environmental testing for Firefly’s Blue Ghost Mission 1 lander in 2024, and seeing the spacecraft achieve a soft Moon landing in March was a point of pride for them. Firefly’s next CLPS delivery debuts a dual-spacecraft configuration and hosts multiple international payloads, with the company’s Elytra Dark orbital vehicle stacked below the Blue Ghost lunar lander. Standing 22 feet (6.9 meters) high, the full structure is more than three times as tall as the Mission 1 lander.
This fall, a structural qualification model of the full stack was clamped to a “shaker table” inside a clean room at JPL and repeatedly rattled in three directions while hundreds of sensors monitored the rapid movement. Then, inside a separate acoustic testing chamber, giant horns blared at it from openings built into the room’s 16-inch-thick (41-centimeter-thick) concrete walls. The horns use compressed nitrogen gas to pummel spacecraft with up to 153 decibels, noise loud enough to cause permanent hearing loss in a human.
Each type of test involves several increasingly intense iterations. Between rounds, JPL’s dynamics environment experts analyze the data to compare what the spacecraft experienced to computer model predictions. Sometimes a discrepancy leads to hardware modifications, sometimes a tweak to the computer model. Engineers and technicians are careful to push the hardware, but not too far.
“You can either under-test or over-test, and both are bad,” William said. “If you over-test, you can break your hardware. If you under-test, it can break on the rocket. It’s a fine line.”
Watch how JPL’s Environmental Test Laboratory preps spacecraftSince the model isn’t itself launching to the Moon, Firefly’s recent Environmental Test Laboratory visit didn’t include several types of trials that are generally completed only for flight hardware. A launchpad-bound spacecraft would undergo electromagnetic testing to ensure that signals from its electronic parts don’t interfere with one another. And, in what is probably the most well-known environmental test, flight-bound hardware is baked or chilled at extreme temperatures in a thermal vacuum chamber from which all the air is sucked out. The multiple thermal vacuum chamber facilities at JPL include two large historic “space simulators” built within NASA’s first few years of existence: a chamber that’s 10 feet in diameter and another that’s 25 feet across.
A full-scale model of Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 2 lunar lander is prepared for delivery into a clean room at JPL’s Environmental Test Laboratory in September. NASA/JPL-Caltech Technicians and engineers at JPL ready a fixture that will attach a full-scale model of Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 2 lunar lander, visible in the background, to a “shaker table” that tests a spacecraft’s readiness to survive the stresses of launch.NASA/JPL-Caltech Qualifying for launchThe completion of Environmental Test Laboratory testing on Firefly’s structural qualification model helps prove the spacecraft will survive its ride out of Earth’s atmosphere aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Firefly’s Blue Ghost Mission 2 team is now turning its focus to completing assembly and testing of the flight hardware for launch.
Once at the Moon, the Blue Ghost lander will touch down on the far side, delivering its payloads to the surface. Those include LuSEE-Night, a radio telescope that is a joint effort by NASA, the U.S. Department of Energy, and University of California, Berkeley’s Space Sciences Laboratory. A payload developed at JPL called User Terminal will test a compact, low-cost S-band radio communications system that could enable future far-side missions to talk to each other and to relay orbiters.
Meantime, Firefly’s Elytra Dark orbital vehicle will have deployed into lunar orbit ESA’s (European Space Agency’s) Lunar Pathfinder communications satellite — a payload on which NASA is collaborating. Both vehicles will remain in orbit and able to relay data from the far-side surface back to Earth.
“Firefly’s Blue Ghost Mission 2 will deliver both NASA and international commercial payloads to further prove out technologies for Artemis and help enable a long-term presence on the Moon,” said Ray Allensworth, Firefly’s spacecraft program director. “The extensive spacecraft environmental testing we did at JPL for Mission 1 was a critical step in Firefly’s test campaign for our historic lunar mission. Now we’re collaborating again to support a successful repeat on the Moon that will unlock even more insights for future robotic and human missions.”
News Media Contact
Melissa Pamer
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
626-314-4928
melissa.pamer@jpl.nasa.gov
2025-141
Share Details Last Updated Dec 16, 2025 Related Terms Explore More 3 min read One of NASA’s Key Cameras Orbiting Mars Takes 100,000th Image Article 5 hours ago 5 min read NASA, Partners Share First Data From New US-European Sea Satellite Article 7 hours ago 3 min read NASA’s Webb, Curiosity Named in TIME’s Best Inventions Hall of FameTwo icons of discovery, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and NASA’s Curiosity rover, have earned…
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Peekaboo!
Clockwise from left, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Kimiya Yui and NASA astronauts Jonny Kim, Zena Cardman, and Mike Fincke pose for a playful portrait through a circular opening in a hatch thermal cover aboard the International Space Station on Sept. 18, 2025.
The cover provides micrometeoroid and orbital debris protection while maintaining cleanliness and pressure integrity in the vestibule between Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus XL cargo spacecraft and the orbital outpost. The opening allows for visual inspection of hatch alignment, access to the hatch handle or pressure equalization valve, and visibility for sensors or cameras during berthing operations.
Kim recently returned to Earth after 245 days in space aboard the orbital laboratory. Yui, Cardman, and Fincke remain aboard the space station, with Fincke as commander.
Image credit: NASA/Jonny Kim
Toxicology and Environmental Chemistry
5 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) An environmental chemist at NASA JSCNASA Ensuring Astronaut SafetyAchieving safe exploration of space in vehicles that rely upon closed environmental systems to recycle air and water to sustain life and are operated in extremely remote locations is a major challenge. The Toxicology and Environmental Chemistry (TEC) group at Johnson Space Center (JSC) is made up of 2 interrelated groups: Toxicology support and the Environmental Chemistry Laboratory. The scientists in both groups play an important role in ensuring that the crew of the ISS are breathing clean air and drinking clean water. Personnel within the TEC establish safe spacecraft environmental limits, monitor the air and water quality aboard current spacecraft (ISS and Commercial Crew and Cargo vehicles), and support technology advancements. The TEC employs in-flight monitoring capabilities as well as postflight sample analysis techniques to monitor the air and water quality from spaceflight.
Fun Fact: We are currently recovering 85% of the water from crew urine and turning it back into drinking water.NASA
An Agency ResourceThe Toxicology group at JSC serves as the NASA-wide resource for aspects of space toxicology and is responsible for several different duties that are focused on protecting crewmembers and spacecraft systems from toxic exposures in spaceflight. These include assessing chemical hazards for flight, establishing limits for contaminants in spacecraft air and water, assessing and evaluating environmental data from spacecraft in flight, and assessing the potential for off-gas products from new vehicles or modules. These assessments are documented in:
Hazardous Materials Summary Tables (HMSTs) and Hazardous Materials data files (HazMats) Spacecraft Maximum Allowable Concentrations (SMACs) and Spacecraft Water Exposure Guidelines (SWEGs) The TEC air quality laboratory.NASAThe Environmental Chemistry laboratory at JSC occupies approximately 6,000 sq. ft. of laboratory space in one of the newest buildings on site. This is a fully equipped environmental and analytical laboratory with analysts that have supported multiple human spaceflight programs and provided center support for both gas and liquid analysis. The work in the laboratories operates under an ISO 9001/AS9100-certified quality plan with dedicated and independent quality personnel.
Liquid chromatograph mass spectrometer.NASAThe Environmental Chemistry Laboratory monitors for contaminants in spacecraft air using both in-flight and post-flight methods. Onboard the International Space Station (ISS), 2 Air Quality Monitors (AQMs) use gas chromatography/differential mobility spectrometry to detect and quantify 23 target volatile organic compounds to provide near real-time insight into the status of the ISS atmosphere. Other real-time monitors supported by the Environmental Chemistry laboratory include the compound-specific analyzer-combustion products (CSA-CP), which use electrochemical sensors to analyze the atmosphere for the presence of compounds produced by fire, and the CO2 monitor, which uses non-dispersive infrared reflectance to monitor for the presence of elevated CO2. For detailed post-flight analysis in the Environmental Chemistry Laboratory, astronauts use grab sample containers to collect in-flight samples, which are then returned to JSC for a detailed environmental analysis. Similarly, formaldehyde monitoring kits contain badges used to collect formaldehyde. These also are returned to the ground for spectroscopic analysis.
Air quality monitors used for volatile organic compound detection positioned in the U.S. Lab on the ISS.NASAThe Environmental Chemistry Laboratory also analyzes archival samples returned from the ISS. The majority of water consumed by crewmembers on the ISS is recycled from a combination of condensed atmospheric humidity and urine. This wastewater is then treated by the U.S. water processor assembly (WPA) to produce potable water, which is analyzed to ensure that the water meets U.S. potability requirements. Samples of the humidity condensate and condensate/urine distillate also are returned for analysis to provide insight into the operation of the WPA and the overall US water recovery system. The TEC relies upon the in-flight analytical capability provided by the ISS total organic carbon analyzer (TOCA) to determine real-time total organic carbon concentrations, which are used to protect ISS crew health as well as manage the U.S. water system consumables. Similarly, the colorimetric water quality monitoring kit (CWQMK) is used to provide insight into the biocide concentration in the U.S. water.
The CSA-CP used to monitor for evidence of fires or smoldering events on the ISS.NASAWater samples are also collected in flight and stored for return to Johnson Space Center. The following ground-based equipment is used to analyze archival samples to ensure suitable air and water quality:
- Liquid Chromatography/Refractive Index Detection (LC/RI)
- Gas Chromatography/Flame Ionization Detector (GC/FID)
- Gas Chromatography/Thermal Conductivity Detector (GC/TCD)
- Trace Gas Analyzer
- Gas Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry (GC/MS)
- Liquid Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry (LC/MS)
- Inductively Coupled Plasma/Mass Spectrometry (ICP/MS)
- Ion Chromatography (IC)
- UV/VIS Spectrophotometry
- Fourier Transform Infrared Reflectance (FTIR)
- Total Organic Carbon Analyzer (TOCA)
In addition to analysis of flight samples and real-time data, the Environmental Chemistry laboratory team plays an important role in the development of new Environmental Control and Life Support Systems hardware by providing analytical support during ground testing. Similarly, the TEC scientists pursue and support technology demonstrations aimed at developing new methods for real-time data collection. Recent examples of this support have included the multi-gas monitor (MGM) and the personal CO2 monitor. TEC scientists make vital contributions to consolidating environmental monitoring hardware to reduce mass and volume requirements, both of which are important as NASA moves to more long-term missions in smaller vehicles.
The U.S. TOCA used to test water quality in real-time on the ISSNASA Spaceflight Air and Water QualityToxicology and Environmental Chemistry (TEC) monitors airborne contaminants in both spacecraft air and water. In-flight monitors are employed to provide real-time insight into the environmental conditions on ISS. Archival samples are collected and returned to Earth for full characterization of ISS air and water.
Results of Post-Flight Analysis of In-Flight Air and Water Samples Points of ContactPaul Mudgett, PhD
Valerie Ryder, PhD DABT
Spencer Williams, PhD DABT
William T. Wallace, PhD
Humans In Space
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Statistics and Data Science
3 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) Statistics and Data Science Enabling Successful ResearchA major aim of biomedical research at NASA is to acquire data to evaluate, understand, and assess the biomedical hazards of spaceflight and to develop effective countermeasures. Data Science (S&DS) personnel provide statistical support to groups within the NASA JSC Human Health and Performance Directorate and other NASA communities. They have expertise in the development of complex study designs, the application of modern statistical methods, and the analysis of data collected under NASA operational constraints (small sample sizes, the limited population of astronauts).
Fun Fact: Did you know statistics is more than just means and standard deviations? Statistics is the science of collecting, analyzing, presenting and interpreting data. NASA depends on data to make decisions and statistics is crucial to making good decisions. Statistics and Data Science (S&DS) help transform data into evidence.NASA
Data Science SupportBeyond statistics, the group aids with data engineering and exploring data. Data engineering includes extracting and transforming data in preparation for analysis and visualization. Data can come in many different formats, the S&DS team helps researchers harmonize (bring data sets together) information across sources. Exploration includes initial analysis and building informative visualizations to deepen the understanding of the evidence. Analyzing and interpreting data to produce insights follow.
S&DS statistician Dr. Alan Feiveson consulting with Lifetime Surveillance of Astronaut Health’s Statistical Data Analyst Caroline Schaefer at a Statistics helpdesk during the Human Research Program’s Investigators’ Workshop in 2017.NASA Statistical Consulting ServicesThe S&DS team provides collaboration and consulting expertise to the Directorate in the application of statistical theory and practice to ongoing biomedical research. Personnel aid in the preparation of sections of research proposals that deal with experiment design, statistical modeling, and subsequent analysis of anticipated research data. Once data are gathered, S&DS statisticians assist with analysis, visualization, and interpretation of results so that investigators can extract the most information while maintaining statistical integrity. A S&DS statistician may be a co-investigator on a project requiring sophisticated statistical modeling and/or analysis techniques. Through collaboration, members of the S&DS team expand their knowledge base in such diverse medical fields as environmental physiology, osteopathy, neurology, pharmacology, microbiology, cardiology, nutrition, and psychology. To meet the unique data collected by NASA, statisticians may develop new techniques to address challenges such as small sample sizes of ISS studies, missing data, operational constraints, and novel measures of outcome.
OutreachCollaborators with the S&DS team often reside within the Directorate, but statistics and data science support is extended to other organizations within the Johnson Space Center, including the Engineering Directorate, Human Resources, and the Education Office. The S&DS team also provides a venue wherein high school, undergraduate, and graduate interns can participate in the analysis and interpretation of NASA biomedical data. Students assigned to the S&DS team have a rare opportunity to gain real-world experience with research in a variety of biomedical fields.
Point of ContactMillennia Young, PhD
Human Health and Performance Capabilities Share Details Last Updated Dec 16, 2025 EditorRobert E. LewisLocationJohnson Space Center Related Terms Explore More 3 min read Bone and Mineral Evaluation and Analysis Article 3 years ago 3 min read Exercise Physiology and Countermeasures Article 3 years ago 1 min read Core Laboratory Article 3 years ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASAHumans In Space
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One of NASA’s Key Cameras Orbiting Mars Takes 100,000th Image
3 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) This view of a region called Syrtis Major is from the 100,000th image captured by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter using its HiRISE camera. Over nearly 20 years, HiRISE has helped scientists understand how the Red Planet’s surface is constantly changing. NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of ArizonaMesas and dunes stand out in the view snapped by HiRISE, one of the imagers aboard the agency’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
After nearly 20 years at the Red Planet, NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has snapped its 100,000th image of the surface with its HiRISE camera. Short for High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment, HiRISE is the instrument the mission relies on for high-resolution images of features ranging from impact craters, sand dunes, and ice deposits to potential landing sites. Those images, in turn, help improve our understanding of Mars and prepare for NASA’s future human missions there.
Captured Oct. 7, this milestone image from the spacecraft shows mesas and dunes within Syrtis Major, a region about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southeast of Jezero Crater, which NASA’s Perseverance rover is exploring. Scientists are analyzing the image to better understand the source of windblown sand that gets trapped in the region’s landscape, eventually forming dunes.
“HiRISE hasn’t just discovered how different the Martian surface is from Earth, it’s also shown us how that surface changes over time,” said MRO’s project scientist, Leslie Tamppari of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “We’ve seen dune fields marching along with the wind and avalanches careening down steep slopes.”
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Watch highlights of images captured by HiRISE, the high-resolution camera aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, including its 100,000th image, showing the plains and dunes of Syrtis Major.NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of ArizonaThe subject of the 100,000th image was recommended by a high school student through the HiWish site, where anyone can suggest parts of the planet to study. Team members at University of Arizona in Tucson, which operates the camera, also make 3D models of HiRISE imagery so that viewers can experience virtual flyover videos.
“Rapid data releases, as well as imaging targets suggested by the broader science community and public, have been a hallmark of HiRISE,” said the camera’s principal investigator, Shane Byrne of the University of Arizona in Tucson. “One hundred thousand images just like this one have made Mars more familiar and accessible for everyone.”
More about MRO
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California manages MRO for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington as part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program portfolio. Lockheed Martin Space in Denver built MRO and supports its operations.
The University of Arizona in Tucson operates HiRISE, which was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., in Boulder, Colorado.
For more information, visit:
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/mars-reconnaissance-orbiter
MRO Captures Images of Comet 3I/ATLAS Mars Orbiter Shines New Light on Martian Mystery Mars Orbiter Learns New Moves After Nearly 20 YearsNews 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
2025-140
Share Details Last Updated Dec 16, 2025 Related Terms Explore More 6 min read NASA JPL Shakes Things Up Testing Future Commercial Lunar Spacecraft Article 1 hour ago 5 min read NASA, Partners Share First Data From New US-European Sea Satellite Article 7 hours ago 3 min read NASA’s Webb, Curiosity Named in TIME’s Best Inventions Hall of FameTwo icons of discovery, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and NASA’s Curiosity rover, have earned…
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Maintaining the Gold Standard: The Future of Landsat Calibration and Validation
By Amit Angal, Senior Engineer at Goddard Space Flight Center
The Landsat Calibration and Validation (Cal/Val) group helps uphold Landsat’s reputation as the gold standard of satellite imagery. They ensure that the Operational Land Imager (OLI) and the Thermal Infrared Sensor (TIRS) aboard Landsats 8 and 9 provide high-quality scientific measurements to users around the world. In 2025, the Cal/Val group contributed over 60 pages to the second edition of “Comprehensive Remote Sensing” (Kaita et. al, 2026), organizing content from NASA, USGS, academia, and industry scientists. Cal/Val support staff authored multiple sections, including a summary of results from Landsat 9 and of the evolution of spectral, spatial, and radiometric characteristics throughout the Landsat missions.
A natural-color Landsat 9 image of Railroad Valley Playa in Nevada, acquired on June 29, 2024. A portion of the playa is used as a radiometric calibration and validation site for various satellite sensors including Landsat 8 and 9’s OLI instruments.NASA/USGSThe Cal/Val team at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center works closely with the Landsat Flight Operations Team to plan weekly calibration activities to maintain the radiometric accuracy of Landsat products. In October 2025, a Landsat 9 anomaly occurred related to its solar array drive assembly (SADA) potentiometer. The spacecraft and instruments were placed in a safehold, pausing data collections. The Cal/Val team assessed the instruments after they recovered from this anomaly, including monitoring the instrument telemetry, detector gains, and noise performance. The team identified a mis-loaded detector map and updated the calibration of both the reflective and thermal emissive bands to ensure consistent, accurate data. After six days in the safehold, the instrument resumed normal operations.
The NASA Cal/Val team supports their USGS counterparts with quarterly updates to the Calibration Parameter File (CPF) by providing inputs for relative and absolute gains as needed. This work involves collaborating with USGS scientists to ensure the consistency of the Combined Radiometric Model (CRaM). The CRaM approach integrates radiometric responses from on-board calibrators to enhance long-term calibration stability throughout mission lifetimes. The CRaM algorithm also provides an extensible framework for future satellite missions. A peer-reviewed publication detailing the CRaM’s approach and future applications was submitted to Science of Remote Sensing.
On January 14-16, 2025, the Landsat Cal/Val team organized and hosted the first semiannual Technical Information Meeting (TIM) at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. NASA and USGS scientists welcomed collaborating scientists from South Dakota State University (SDSU), the University of Arizona Tucson, and Rochester Institute of Technology for presentations and discussions on Landsat imaging performance, algorithms, and instrument health. On May 28-29, 2025, the Cal/Val team attended the second semiannual TIM at SDSU.
The Landsat Cal/Val Team is validating the accuracy of the Harmonized Landsat and Sentinel-2 (HLS) v2.0 product, which combines data from multiple satellites to create a continuous record of Earth’s surface reflectance measurements since 2013. The team is testing the dataset using RadCalNet, a global network of automated ground stations that provide precise, standardized measurements. The team compared measurements from four RadCalNet sites, including the well-established Railroad Valley Playa site in Nevada, against near-simultaneous HLS data. Their analysis shows the satellite and ground measurements agree within expected uncertainty ranges—a strong validation of the HLS product’s accuracy.
The team presented these findings at the CEOS IVOS calibration meeting in Tucson, Arizona (September 1-5, 2025) and is currently preparing a peer-reviewed article to share the complete results.
Path ForwardThe Cal/Val team applies lessons learned from Landsat missions to better plan calibration efforts for the next generation of instruments. Using instrument performance checklists from Landsat 8/9, the team is building a framework of in-house geometric and radiometric testing and extending algorithms for future Landsat instruments.
The Landsat Cal/Val Team is actively tackling a critical challenge in solar irradiance modeling. While new hyperspectral sensor technologies have made it possible to create highly accurate solar models with much lower uncertainty, the remote sensing community still lacks agreed-upon methods for applying these advanced models. A dedicated subgroup within the Landsat Cal/Val Team is now developing and testing standardized approaches to bridge this gap. Their goal is to create clear recommendations and best practices that the scientific community can refine together and implement consistently.
This work addresses a fundamental need—transforming promising hyperspectral solar modeling capabilities into practical, standardized tools that researchers can confidently use across different projects and applications.
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Article 2 weeks agoMicrobiology
2 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) Microbiology Laboratory at JSC NASA. Microorganisms and SpaceflightSpaceflight poses a risk of adverse health effects due to the interactions between microorganisms, their hosts, and their environment. The JSC Microbiology team addresses the benefits and risks related to microorganisms, including infectious disease, allergens, environmental and food contamination, and the impacts of changes in environmental and human microbial ecology aboard spacecraft. The team includes certified medical technologists, environmental microbiologists, mycologists, and biosafety professionals.
The JSC Microbiology laboratory is a critical component of the Human Health and Performance Directorate and is responsible for addressing crew health and environmental issues related to microbial infection, allergens, and contamination. This responsibility is achieved by operational monitoring and investigative research using classical microbiological, advanced molecular, and immunohistochemical techniques. This research has resulted in a significant number of presentations and peer-reviewed publications contributing to the field of Microbiology with articles in journals such as Infection and Immunity, Journal of Infectious Disease and Applied and Environmental Microbiology, Nature Reviews Microbiology, and Proceedings of the National Academies of Science.
Fun Fact: Microorganisms display unexpected responses when grown in the spaceflight environment compared to otherwise identically grown microbes on Earth.NASA
Christian Castro is streaking bacteria to be characterized using a variety of culture media. Photo Date: May 29, 2018. Location: Building 21 – Microbiology Lab. NASA Keeping Crew-members SafeAs a functional part of the Crew Health Care System and in support of Environmental Control and Life Support Systems engineers, the Microbiology Laboratory team defines requirements, coordinates and analyzes microbial sampling, and analysis of air, surface, and water samples. These environmental samples, including preflight and in-flight samples, re-analyzed to ensure that microorganisms do not adversely affect crew health or system performance.
Microbiologists also serve as team members when anomalous events occur that might affect crew health or life support systems operations. Spaceflight food samples also are evaluated preflight to decrease the risk of infectious disease to the crew.
A crewmember identifies unknown environmental microbes aboard the ISS through DNA sequencing.NASA Technology and Hardware- ABI DNA sequencer
- Illumina MiSeq desktop sequencer
- Oxford Nanopore Technologies MinION DNA / RNA sequencers
- Agilent Bioanalyzer
- VITEK 2 Microbial Identification
- Space analogue bioreactors
Mark Ott, PhD
Sarah Wallace, PhD
Hang Nguyen, PhD
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NextSTEP-3 B: Moon to Mars Architecture Studies
Notice ID: M2M-MSFC-0001
NAICS Codes:
- 541715 – Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences (except Nanotechnology and Biotechnology)
NASA seeks industry-led architecture concept development, concept refinement studies, and risk-reduction activities that address Moon to Mars Architecture gaps through the Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships-3 (NextSTEP-3). NASA plans to release this solicitation — NextSTEP-3 Appendix B: Moon to Mars Architectural Studies — near the beginning of calendar year 2026. For full details, consult the links under the notice ID above.
NASA’s Moon to Mars Architecture defines capabilities needed for long-term, human-led scientific discovery in deep space. The agency’s architecture approach distills agency-developed objectives into capabilities and elements that support exploration and science goals. NASA continuously evolves that blueprint for crewed exploration, setting humanity on a path to the Moon, Mars, and beyond by collaborating with experts across industry, academia, and the international community.
This proposed solicitation seeks partner participation on a recurring basis, targeting several calls per year for proposal submissions. The proposals should focus on topics addressing infrastructure, transportation, habitation, concepts of operations, and planetary science capabilities identified in the latest revision of the Architecture Definition Document. The solicitation establishes a flexible acquisition strategy that accommodates both directed-topic calls on specific areas of government interest, as well as open topic calls.
NASA anticipates the first Appendix B directed-topic study calls will focus on lunar and Mars mission concepts. NASA intends to issue a directed call for research into an integrated surface power infrastructure (or power grid) that can evolve to support increasingly ambitious lunar missions. (Note: this call excludes proposals addressing the Fission Surface Power System Announcement for Partnership Proposal but may include all technology solutions including alternate fission, solar hybrid, or other power grid approaches.)
Concurrently, NASA will issue a directed call for Mars crew transportation concept development, trade studies, and identification of risk reduction activities. This call would include in-space transportation, Mars surface access, and Mars ascent options for crew and cargo.
Bassac River, Southern Vietnam
A camera on the International Space Station captured this Oct. 2, 2025, photo of the Bassac River in Cù Lao Dung, a river islet district in southern Vietnam. The Bassac River surrounds the district before emptying into the South China Sea. The river’s brown waters at its mouth result from massive amounts of silt, clay, and organic matter carried from upstream regions of the Mekong River Basin, combined with tidal forces from the sea that stir up sediment. This photograph was taken from as the space station orbited 260 miles above Earth.
Image credit: NASA
NASA’s Roman Telescope Will Observe Thousands of Newfound Cosmic Voids
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Our universe is filled with galaxies, in all directions as far as our instruments can see. Some researchers estimate that there are as many as two trillion galaxies in the observable universe. At first glance, these galaxies might appear to be randomly scattered across space, but they’re not. Careful mapping has shown that they are distributed across the surfaces of giant cosmic “bubbles” up to several hundred million light-years across. Inside these bubbles, few galaxies are found, so those regions are called cosmic voids. NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will allow us to measure these voids with new precision, which can tell us about the history of the universe’s expansion.
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This narrated video sequence illustrates how NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will be able to observe cosmic voids in the universe. These highly detailed measurements will help constrain cosmological models.Credit: Video: NASA, STScI; Visualization: Frank Summers (STScI); Script Writer: Frank Summers (STScI); Narration: Frank Summers (STScI); Audio: Danielle Kirshenblat (STScI); Science: Giulia Degni (Roma Tre University), Alice Pisani (CPPM), Giovanni Verza (Center for Computational Astrophysics/Flatiron Inst.)“Roman’s ability to observe wide areas of the sky to great depths, spotting an abundance of faint and distant galaxies, will revolutionize the study of cosmic voids,” said Giovanni Verza of the Flatiron Institute and New York University, lead author on a paper published in The Astrophysical Journal.
Cosmic RecipeThe cosmos is made of three key components: normal matter, dark matter, and dark energy. The gravity of normal and dark matter tries to slow the expansion of the universe, while dark energy opposes gravity to speed up the universe’s expansion. The nature of both dark matter and dark energy are currently unknown. Scientists are trying to understand them by studying their effects on things we can observe, such as the distribution of galaxies across space.
“Since they’re relatively empty of matter, voids are regions of space that are dominated by dark energy. By studying voids, we should be able to put powerful constraints on the nature of dark energy,” said co-author Alice Pisani of CNRS (the French National Centre for Scientific Research) in France and Princeton University in New Jersey.
To determine how Roman might study voids, the researchers considered one potential design of the Roman High-Latitude Wide-Area Survey, one of three core community surveys that Roman will conduct. The High-Latitude Wide-Area Survey will look away from the plane of our galaxy (hence the term high latitude in galactic coordinates). The team found that this survey should be able to detect and measure tens of thousands of cosmic voids, some as small as just 20 million light-years across. Such large numbers of voids will allow scientists to use statistical methods to determine how their observed shapes are influenced by the key components of the universe.
To determine the actual, 3D shapes of the voids, astronomers will use two types of data from Roman — the positions of galaxies in the sky and their cosmological redshift, the latter of which is determined using spectroscopic data. To convert redshift to a physical distance, astronomers make assumptions about the components of the universe, including the strength of dark energy and how it might have evolved over time.
Pisani compared it to trying to infer a cake recipe (i.e., the universe’s makeup) from the final dessert served to you. “You try to put in the right ingredients — the right amount of matter, the right amount of dark energy — and then you check whether your cake looks as it should. If it doesn’t, that means you put in the wrong ingredients.”
In this case, the appearance of the “cake” is the shape found by statistically stacking all of the voids detected by Roman on top of each other. On average, voids are expected to have a spherical shape because there is no “preferred” location or direction in the universe (i.e., the universe is both homogeneous and isotropic on large scales). This means that, if the stacking is done correctly, the resulting shape will be perfectly round (or spherically symmetric). If not, then you have to adjust your cosmic recipe.
Power of RomanThe researchers emphasized that to study cosmic voids in large numbers, an observatory must be able to probe a large volume of the universe, because the voids themselves can be tens or hundreds of millions of light-years across. The spectroscopic data necessary to study voids will come from a portion of the Roman High-Latitude Wide-Area Survey that will cover on the order of 2,400 square degrees of the sky, or 12,000 full moons. It will also be able to see fainter and more distant objects, yielding a greater density of galaxies than complementary missions like ESA’s (European Space Agency’s) Euclid.
“Voids are defined by the fact that they contain so few galaxies. So to detect voids, you have to be able to observe galaxies that are quite sparse and faint. With Roman, we can better look at the galaxies that populate voids, which ultimately will give us greater understanding of the cosmological parameters like dark energy that are sculpting voids,” said co-author Giulia Degni of Roma Tre University and INFN (the National Institute of Nuclear Physics) in Rome.
The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is managed at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, with participation by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California; Caltech/IPAC in Pasadena, California; the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore; and a science team comprising scientists from various research institutions. The primary industrial partners are BAE Systems, Inc. in Boulder, Colorado; L3Harris Technologies in Melbourne, Florida; and Teledyne Scientific & Imaging in Thousand Oaks, California.
By Christine Pulliam
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.
cpulliam@stsci.edu
Unexpected Trajectory: Erin Sholl’s Path to Human Spaceflight Safety
Career paths are rarely a straight line and often include some unexpected curves. That is certainly true for Erin Sholl, deputy chief of the Space Transportation Systems Division within the Safety and Mission Assurance Directorate at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. From struggling with multiplication tables in elementary school to supporting the International Space Station from the Mission Control Center, her journey has been full of twists and turns.
Erin Sholl (second from right) received the Johnson Space Center Director’s Commendation Award in 2017 for significant achievements and exemplary contributions to the International Space Station and Commercial Crew Programs as the Safety and Mission Assurance Visiting Vehicles Group lead. NASA/James BlairDespite her early difficulties in math and science, Sholl eventually grew to love and excel in both subjects. She planned to study chemical engineering in college – inspired by a love of chemistry and a favorite high school teacher – but discovered a greater affinity for physics once she arrived at Pennsylvania State University. She switched her major to aerospace engineering and soon met a classmate who had interned at Johnson. After that, Sholl declared, “The dream was born!”
Her first position at Johnson was as a trajectory operations officer for the Flight Operations Directorate. She spent six years supporting the space station on console in the Mission Control Center, describing the experience as “something out of the movies.” When Sholl went looking for a new challenge, she landed in the Safety and Mission Assurance Directorate.
Erin Sholl working on console as a trajectory operations officer in the Mission Control Center during the STS-128/17A mission in 2009. NASA/Lauren Harnett“I was drawn to the Operations and Visiting Vehicles Branch because it had many similar aspects to my previous position – real-time operations and visiting vehicles,” she said. “I worked various roles over the next 12 years, gradually taking on more responsibility, and eventually becoming a group lead, then branch chief.” Sholl also served as acting deputy chief for the Space Habitation Systems Division, which oversees the Operations and Visiting Vehicles Branch. Her performance drew the attention of the Space Transportation Systems Division’s chief. “He asked me to come be his deputy, and that is where I still am today!”
The Space Transportation Systems Division provides system safety, reliability, and risk analysis for human spaceflight programs. The division works with the different program offices to reduce risk through technical assessments and guidance on Safety and Mission Assurance requirements throughout program and project lifecycles.
Sholl works closely with the division chief to support strategic planning, budgeting, and operations. “A key part of my role is connecting with people – both inside and outside the division – to ensure smooth communication and representation of the team’s needs,” she said. She leverages her relationship-building and strategic thinking skills to lead initiatives that advance the division’s and the directorate’s goals and to mentor employees.
Erin Sholl (center) receives a certificate of achievement from Terrence Wilcutt, former director of the Office of Safety and Mission Assurance (SMA) at NASA Headquarters, and Patricia Petete, former director of SMA at Johnson, after completing requirements for the Safety and Mission Assurance Technical Excellence Program in System Safety. Image courtesy of Erin ShollSholl believes strongly in the power of mentorship. “Having various mentors, both formal and informal, has been so important throughout my career,” she said. “Listening to what these people were saying about my strengths led me to a path I’d never considered because I hadn’t seen those things in myself.” Being a mentor and advocate for team members is one of Sholl’s favorite parts of the leadership positions she has held, particularly as branch chief. “I really felt like I could connect with my people and advocate for them in a way that felt meaningful,” she said.
She encourages young professionals to seek out mentors or opportunities to shadow colleagues in different roles. “Relationships are the key to everything,” she said. “The more people you meet and the more you learn about different paths in space exploration, the better off you will be in your career.”
Susan Schuh, Flight Crew Integration Operational Habitability (OpsHab) team lead and Erin Sholl host a JSC Parenting community event in 2023.Image courtesy of Erin ShollSholl noted that professional relationships can be bolstered by activities outside of the office. She played a key role in establishing and growing JSC Parenting, a virtual community of about 600 employees who share information and support each other on issues related to caregiving, schooling, and balancing work with family life. “My leadership within the community enhances my professional leadership and positively impacts my colleagues,” she said.
Sholl also emphasized the importance of being open to trying new things, even if an opportunity seems to diverge from your expected career path. “I volunteer for everything because I am always eager to learn more and find out what else I might be good at and how else I can serve my team,” she said. “I think it’s easy to feel intimidated hearing about other people’s career paths, because they often sound so perfectly planned and successful. You rarely hear about the pivots, setbacks, or decisions made for personal reasons.”
The reality, she added, is more complex. “I tried for many roles I didn’t get, and it took a lot of trial and error to find my path to a career I really love.”
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Every year for decades, long rivers of smoke and haze have spread across the Indo-Gangetic Plain in northern India from October to December. That’s when farmers in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and other states burn off plant “stubble” after the rice harvest.
When winds are weak and the atmosphere becomes stagnant, the haze can push levels of air pollution several times higher than limits recommended by the World Health Organization. Smoke typically mixes with particles and gases from other sources, such as industry, vehicles, domestic fires (heating and cooking), fireworks, and dust storms, to form the haze, though scientists consider stubble burning to be a major factor.
In some ways, the seasonal timing of stubble fires in 2025 followed typical patterns. Air quality deteriorated in Delhi and several other cities for about a month after crop fires intensified during the last week of October, explained Hiren Jethva, a Morgan State University atmospheric scientist based at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. For about a decade, Jethva has tracked the stubble burning season in India using satellites, and has made predictions about the intensity of the upcoming fire season based on vegetation observations.
The MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) on NASA’s Aqua satellite captured this image of a smoky haze darkening skies over much of the plain on November 11, 2025. According to news reports, it was the first of several days in 2025 when pollution levels exceeded 400 on India’s air quality index, the strongest rating on the scale. As in past years, the poor air quality prompted officials in some areas to close schools and institute more stringent air quality controls on construction.
However, the daily timing of burning departs from what Jethva has seen in the past. He started tracking the number of fires years ago by primarily tallying observations from MODIS—which pass over locations on Earth each morning and afternoon on the Terra and Aqua satellites, respectively. Then, most fires were lit in the early afternoon between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. local time.
But in the past few years, stubble fires have occurred progressively later in the day, Jethva said. He identified the shift by analyzing observations from GEO-KOMPSAT-2A, a South Korean geostationary satellite launched in late 2018 that collects data every 10 minutes.
Most stubble fires now happen between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m., he said, meaning that fire-monitoring systems that rely solely on MODIS, or similar sensors like VIIRS (Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite), miss many of the fires. “Farmers have changed their behavior,” he said.
His analysis of GEO-KOMPSAT-2A observations indicates that the stubble burning activity in Punjab and Haryana was moderate in 2025 compared to other recent years. This year had higher numbers of fires compared to 2024, 2020, and 2019 but fewer fires than 2023, 2022, and 2021, he found.
Indian Space Research Organization researchers have also pointed out the shift in the timing of stubble burning. In a Current Science study published in 2025, one group reported that MSG (Meteosat Second Generation) satellite observations showed a shift in peak fire activity from about 1:30 p.m. in 2020 to about 5:00 p.m. in 2024. In December 2025, researchers with the International Forum for Environment, Sustainability, & Technology (iForest) released a multi-satellite analysis that came to a similar conclusion.
Meanwhile, parsing out precisely how much stubble fires contribute to poor air quality in Delhi compared to other sources of pollution remains a topic of active study and debate among scientists. “Studies report contributions ranging from 10 to 50 percent,” said Pawan Gupta, a NASA research scientist who specializes in air quality.
Gupta estimates that the stubble burning contribution ranges from 40 to 70 percent on a given day, dropping to 20 to 30 percent if averaged over a month or burning season, and under 10 percent if averaged annually. “Meteorological conditions—like a shallow boundary layer height and low temperature—during the burning season add extra complexity,” he said.
The timing of the fires may influence the degree to which stubble burning affects air quality. Some modeling research suggests that evening fires may lead to a stronger overnight buildup of particle pollution than early-afternoon fires because the planetary boundary layer, the lowest part of the atmosphere, tends to be shallower and have weaker winds at night, allowing pollutants to accumulate.
NASA Earth Observatory image by Michala Garrison, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS LANCE and GIBS/Worldview. Story by Adam Voiland.
References and Resources- Biswal, A., et al. (2025) Emission time and amount of crop residue burning play critical role on PM2.5 variability during October–November in northwestern India during 2022–2024. Environmental Science: Atmospheres, 11.
- Burki, T. (2025) Stubble: The Farmer’s Bane. The Lancet Respiratory Medicine, 13(2), 207.
- The Deccan Herald (2025, December 8) Punjab, Haryana farmers change stubble burning time window to avoid satellite detection. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- Down to Earth (2025, November 26) Why has Madhya Pradesh burnt more paddy stubble for the second year in a row? Accessed December 9, 2025.
- Jethva, H., et al. (2019) Connecting Crop Productivity, Residue Fires, and Air Quality over Northern India. Scientific Reports, 9, 16594.
- Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (2025, December 1) Paddy Harvesting Season 2025 concludes with significant Reduction in Farm Fire Incidents across Punjab and Haryana. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- NASA (2024, October 18) What is Air Quality? Accessed December 9, 2025.
- NASA Earth Observatory (2020, November 17) A Busy Season for Crop Fires in Northwestern India. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- NASA Earth Observatory (2025, January 22) Is Fire Activity Declining in Northwestern India? Accessed December 9, 2025.
- NDTV (2025, December 1) Stubble Burning Down By 90% In Punjab, Haryana, Centre Informs Parliament. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- NDTV (2025, December 9) Farm Fires Didn’t End, They Just Moved To Afternoon: Satellite Data Analysis. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- The New Indian Express (2025, November 11) AQI spikes to 428 in first ‘severe’ air day of this year, GRAP-III invoked in capital. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- Singh, N., et al. (2025) Evidence of shift in stubble burning timing over northwest India from geostationary satellite observations. Current Science, 129(10), 921-923.
- The Times of India (2025, December 6) Stubble burning cases jump by 18% in UP this year. Accessed December 9, 2025.
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NASA Astronaut Jonny Kim to Discuss Eight-Month Space Station Mission
NASA astronaut Jonny Kim will recap his recent mission aboard the International Space Station during a news conference at 3:30 p.m. EST Friday, Dec. 19, from the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Watch the news conference live on NASA’s YouTube channel. Learn how to stream NASA content through a variety of online platforms, including social media.
Media interested in participating in person must contact the NASA Johnson newsroom no later than 5 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 18, at 281-483-5111 or jsccommu@mail.nasa.gov.
Media wishing to participate by phone must contact the Johnson newsroom no later than two hours before the start of the event. To ask questions by phone, media must dial into the news conference no later than 15 minutes prior to the start of the call. NASA’s media accreditation policy is available online.
Kim returned to Earth on Dec. 9, along with Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Alexey Zubritsky. He logged 245 days as an Expedition 72/73 flight engineer during his first spaceflight. The trio completed 3,920 orbits of the Earth over the course of their nearly 104-million-mile journey. They also saw the arrival of nine visiting spacecraft and the departure of six.
During his mission, Kim contributed to a wide range of scientific investigations and technology demonstrations. He studied the behavior of bioprinted tissues containing blood vessels in microgravity for an experiment helping advance space-based tissue production to treat patients on Earth. He also evaluated the remote command of multiple robots in space for the Surface Avatar study, which could support the development of robotic assistants for future exploration missions. Additionally, Kim worked on developing in-space manufacturing of DNA-mimicking nanomaterials, which could improve drug delivery technologies and support emerging therapeutics and regenerative medicine.
Learn more about International Space Station research and operations at:
-end-
Jimi Russell
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1100
james.j.russell@nasa.gov
Shaneequa Vereen
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111
shaneequa.y.vereen@nasa.gov
NASA’s Webb, Curiosity Named in TIME’s Best Inventions Hall of Fame
Two icons of discovery, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and NASA’s Curiosity rover, have earned places in TIME’s “Best Inventions Hall of Fame,” which recognizes the 25 groundbreaking inventions of the past quarter century that have had the most global impact, since TIME began its annual Best Inventions list in 2000. The inventions are celebrated in TIME’s December print issue.
“NASA does the impossible every day, and it starts with the visionary science that propels humanity farther than ever before,” said Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Congratulations to the teams who made the world’s great engineering feats, the James Webb Space Telescope and the Mars Curiosity Rover, a reality. Through their work, distant galaxies feel closer, and the red sands of Mars are more familiar, as they expanded and redefined the bounds of human achievement in the cosmos for the benefit of all.”
Decades in the making and operating a million miles from Earth, Webb is the most powerful space telescope ever built, giving humanity breathtaking views of newborn stars, distant galaxies, and even planets orbiting other stars. The new technologies developed to enable Webb’s science goals – from optics to detectors to thermal control systems – now also touch Americans’ everyday lives, improving manufacturing for everything from high-end cameras and contact lenses to advanced semiconductors and inspections of aircraft engine components.
This 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 James Webb Space Telescope, this image reveals for the first time previously invisible areas of star birth. NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScIMeanwhile on Mars, the unstoppable Curiosity rover, NASA’s car-size science lab, has spent more than a decade uncovering clues that the Red Planet once could have supported life, transforming our understanding of our planetary neighbor. These NASA missions continue to make breakthroughs that have reshaped our understanding of the universe and our place in it. Curiosity has also paved the way for future astronauts: Its Radiation Assessment Detector has studied the Martian radiation environment for nearly 14 years, and its unforgettable landing by robotic jetpack allowed heavier spacecraft to touch down on the surface — a capability that will be needed to send cargo and humans to Mars.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover used two different cameras to create this selfie in front of Mont Mercou, a rock outcrop that stands 20 feet (6 meters) tall. The panorama is made up of 60 images taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on the rover’s robotic arm on March 26, 2021, the 3,070th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. These were combined with 11 images taken by the Mastcam on the mast, or “head,” of the rover on March 16, 2021, the 3,060th Martian day of the mission. NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSSTo compile this “Hall of Fame” list, TIME solicited nominations from TIME editors and correspondents around the world, paying special attention to high-impact fields, such as health care and technology. TIME then evaluated each contender on a number of key factors, including originality, continued efficacy, ambition, and impact.
The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).
The Curiosity rover 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 as part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program portfolio.
To learn more about NASA’s science missions, visit:
Share Details Last Updated Dec 12, 2025 Editor Marty McCoy Contact Laura Betz laura.e.betz@nasa.gov Related Terms Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA
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Science Missions
A Rare Gourd
NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured an uncommon sight – the death of a low-mass star – in this image of the Calabash Nebula released on Feb. 3, 2017.
Here, we can see the star going through a rapid transformation from a red giant to a planetary nebula, during which it blows its outer layers of gas and dust out into the surrounding space. The recently ejected material is spat out in opposite directions with immense speed — the gas shown in yellow is moving close to a million kilometers an hour.
Astronomers rarely capture a star in this phase of its evolution because it occurs within the blink of an eye – in astronomical terms. Over the next thousand years the nebula is expected to evolve into a fully-fledged planetary nebula.
NASA Announces Plan to Map Milky Way With Roman Space Telescope
NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope team has released detailed plans for a major survey that will reveal our home galaxy, the Milky Way, in unprecedented detail. In one month of observations spread across two years, the survey will unveil tens of billions of stars and explore previously uncharted structures.
This video begins with a view of the Carina Nebula — a giant, relatively nearby star-forming region in the southern sky. Roman will view the entire nebula as well as its surroundings, including a 10,000 light-year-long swath of the spiral arm it resides in. The observation will offer an unparalleled opportunity to watch how stars grow, interact, and sculpt their environments, and it’s just one of many thousands of highlights astronomers are looking forward to from the Galactic Plane Survey NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will conduct.Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
“The Galactic Plane Survey will revolutionize our understanding of the Milky Way,” said Julie McEnery, Roman’s senior project scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “We’ll be able to explore the mysterious far side of our galaxy and its star-studded heart. Because of the survey’s breadth and depth, it will be a scientific mother lode.”
The Galactic Plane Survey is Roman’s first selected general astrophysics survey — one of many observation programs Roman will do in addition to its three core surveys and Coronagraph technology demonstration. At least 25% of Roman’s five-year primary mission is reserved for astronomers worldwide to propose more surveys beyond the core programs, fully leveraging Roman’s capabilities to conduct groundbreaking science. Roman is slated to launch by May 2027, but the team is on track for launch as early as fall 2026.
While ESA’s (European Space Agency’s) retired Gaia spacecraft mapped around 2 billion Milky Way stars in visible light, many parts of the galaxy remain hidden by dust. By surveying in infrared light, Roman will use powerful heat vision that can pierce this veil to see what lies beyond.
“It blows my mind that we will be able to see through the densest part of our galaxy and explore it properly for the first time,” said Rachel Street, a senior scientist at Las Cumbres Observatory in Santa Barbara, California, and a co-chair of the committee that selected the Galactic Plane Survey design.
This infographic describes the 29-day Galactic Plane Survey that will be conducted by NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. The survey’s main component will cover 691 square degrees — a region of sky as large as around 3,500 full moons — in 22.5 days. Roman will also view a smaller area — 19 square degrees, the area of 95 full moons — repeatedly for about 5.5 days total to capture things that change over time. The survey’s final component will image a smattering of even smaller areas, adding up to about 4 square degrees (the area of 20 full moons) and 31 total hours, with Roman’s full suite of filters and spectroscopic tools. The survey will reveal our home galaxy in unprecedented detail including many in regions we’ve never been able to see before because they’re blocked by dust, unveiling tens of billions of stars and other objects.Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight CenterThe survey will cover nearly 700 square degrees (a region of sky as large as about 3,500 full moons) along the glowing band of the Milky Way — our edge-on view of the disk-shaped structure containing most of our galaxy’s stars, gas, and dust. Scientists expect the survey to map up to 20 billion stars and detect tiny shifts in their positions with repeated high-resolution observations. And it will only take 29 days spread over the course of the mission’s first two years.
Cosmic CradlesStars are born from parent clouds of gas and dust. Roman will peer through the haze of these nesting grounds to see millions of stellar embryos, newborn stars still swaddled in shrouds of dust, tantrumming toddler stars that flare unpredictably, and young stars that may have planetary systems forming around them. Astronomers will study stellar birth rates across a wide range of masses and stitch together videos that show how stars change over time.
“This survey will study such a huge number of stars in so many different stellar environments that we’ll be sampling every phase of a star’s evolution,” Street said.
Observing so many stars in various stages of early development will shed light on the forces that shape them. Star formation is like a four way tug-of-war between gravity, radiation, magnetism, and turbulence. Roman will help us study how these forces influence whether gas clouds collapse into full-fledged stars, smaller brown dwarfs — in-between objects that are much heavier than planets but not massive enough to ignite like stars — or new worlds.
The Galactic Plane Survey by NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will scan the densest part of our galaxy, where most of its stars, gas, and dust reside — the most difficult region to study from our place inside the Milky Way since we have to look through so much light-blocking material. Roman’s wide field of view, crisp resolution, and infrared vision will help astronomers peer through thick bands of dust to chart new galactic territory.Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Some stars are born in enormous litters called clusters. Roman will study nearly 2,000 young, loosely bound open clusters to see how the galaxy’s spiral arms trigger star formation. The survey will also map dozens of ancient, densely packed globular clusters near the center of the galaxy that could help astronomers reconstruct the Milky Way’s early history.
Comparing Roman’s snapshots of clusters scattered throughout the galaxy will enable scientists to study nature versus nurture on a cosmic scale. Because a cluster’s stars generally share the same age, origin, and chemical makeup, analyzing them allows astronomers to isolate environmental effects very precisely.
Pulse CheckWhen they run out of fuel, Sun-like stars leave behind cores called white dwarfs and heavier stars collapse to form neutron stars and black holes. Roman will find these stellar embers even when they’re alone thanks to wrinkles in space-time.
Anything that has mass warps the underlying fabric of the universe. When light from a background star passes through the gravitational well around an intervening object on its journey toward Earth, its path slightly curves around the object. This phenomenon, called microlensing, can temporarily brighten the star. By studying these signals, astronomers can learn the mass and size of otherwise invisible foreground objects.
A separate survey — Roman’s Galactic Bulge Time-Domain Survey — will conduct deep microlensing observations over a smaller area in the heart of the Milky Way. The Galactic Plane Survey will conduct repeated observations over a shorter interval but across the whole center of the galaxy, giving us the first complete view of this complex galactic environment. An unobscured view of the galaxy’s central bar will help astronomers answer the question of its origin, and Roman’s videos of stars in this region will enable us to study some ultratight binary objects at the very ends of their lives thanks to their interactions with close companions.
“Compact binaries are particularly interesting because they’re precursors to gravitational-wave sources,” said Robert Benjamin, a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, and a co-chair of the committee that selected the Galactic Plane Survey design. When neutron stars and black holes merge, the collision is so powerful that it sends ripples through the fabric of space-time. “Scientists want to know more about the pathways that lead to those mergers.”
optical infrared This colorful image, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and published in 2018, celebrated the observatory’s 28th anniversary of viewing the heavens. opticalinfrared This colorful image, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and published in 2018, celebrated the observatory’s 28th anniversary of viewing the heavens. optical infraredOptical vs infrared
Two Views CurtainToggle2-Up Image Details The Galactic Plane Survey by NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will scan the densest part of our galaxy, where most of its stars, gas, and dust reside — the most difficult region to study from our place inside the Milky Way since we have to look through so much light-blocking material. Roman’s wide field of view, crisp resolution, and infrared vision will help astronomers peer through thick bands of dust to chart new galactic territory. Credit: NASA, ESA, and STScIRoman’s repeated observations will also monitor stars that flicker. Ground-based surveys detect thousands of bright stellar outbursts, but often can’t see the faint, dust-obscured stars that produce them. Roman will pinpoint the culprits plus take high-resolution snapshots of the aftermath.
Some stars throb rhythmically, and the speed of their pulsing is directly linked to their intrinsic brightness. By comparing their true brightness to how bright they appear from Earth, astronomers can measure distances across the galaxy. Roman will find these blinking stars farther away than ever before and track them over time, helping astronomers improve their cosmic measuring sticks.
“Pairing Roman’s Galactic Plane Survey with other Milky Way observations will create the best portrait of the galaxy we’ve ever had,” Benjamin said.
Download additional images and video from NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio.
For more information about the Roman Space Telescope, visit:
By Ashley Balzer
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
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Claire Andreoli
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Massive Stars Make Their Mark in Hubble Image
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Massive Stars Make Their Mark in Hubble Image This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the blue dwarf galaxy Markarian 178 (Mrk 178) against a backdrop of distant galaxies in all shapes and sizes. Some of these distant galaxies even shine through the diffuse edges of Mrk 178. ESA/Hubble & NASA, F. Annibali, S. HongThis NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features a glittering blue dwarf galaxy called Markarian 178 (Mrk 178). The galaxy, which is substantially smaller than our own Milky Way, lies 13 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major (the Great Bear).
Mrk 178 is one of more than 1,500 Markarian galaxies. These galaxies get their name from the Armenian astrophysicist Benjamin Markarian, who compiled a list of galaxies that were surprisingly bright in ultraviolet light.
While the bulk of the galaxy is blue due to an abundance of young, hot stars with little dust shrouding them, Mrk 178 gets a red hue from a collection of rare massive Wolf–Rayet stars. These stars are concentrated in the brightest, reddish region near the galaxy’s edge. Wolf–Rayet stars cast off their atmospheres through powerful winds, and the bright emission lines from their hot stellar winds are etched upon the galaxy’s spectrum. Both ionized hydrogen and oxygen lines are particularly strong and appear as a red color in this photo.
Massive stars enter the Wolf–Rayet phase of their evolution just before they collapse into black holes or neutron stars. Because Wolf–Rayet stars last for only a few million years, researchers know that something must have triggered a recent burst of star formation in Mrk 178. At first glance, it’s not clear what could be the cause — Mrk 178 doesn’t seem to have any close galactic neighbors that may have stirred up its gas to form new stars. Instead, researchers suspect that a gas cloud crashed into Mrk 178, or that the intergalactic medium disturbed its gas as the galaxy moved through space. Either disturbance could light up this tiny galaxy with a ripple of bright new stars.
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Claire Andreoli (claire.andreoli@nasa.gov)
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Pacific Moisture Drenches the U.S. Northwest
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Waves of heavy rainfall in early December 2025 spurred landslides and flooding in parts of the Pacific Northwest. The deluge was the result of a potent atmospheric river that took aim at the region starting around December 7.
Atmospheric rivers are long, narrow bands of moisture that move like rivers in the sky, transporting water vapor from the tropics toward the poles. They occur around the planet, most often in autumn and winter, with the U.S. West Coast typically affected by moist air that originates near Hawaii. In this event, however, some of the moisture arrived from even farther away, originating roughly 7,000 miles (11,000 kilometers) across the Pacific from near the Philippines.
This map shows the total precipitable water vapor in the atmosphere at 11:30 p.m. Pacific Time on December 10. It is derived from NASA’s GEOS (Goddard Earth Observing System) and uses satellite data and models of physical processes to approximate what is happening in the atmosphere.
Precipitable water vapor represents the amount of water contained in a column of air, assuming all the water vapor condensed into liquid. The map’s green areas indicate the highest amounts of moisture. Note that not all precipitable water vapor falls as rain; at least some remains in the atmosphere. Nor is it a cap on how much rain can fall, since rainfall can increase as more moisture flows into a column of air. Still, it serves as a useful indicator of areas where excessive rainfall is likely.
According to the National Weather Service, preliminary ground-based measurements showed that several locations in western Washington received more than 10 inches (250 millimeters) of rain over a 72-hour period ending on the morning of December 11. Seattle-Tacoma International Airport set a daily rainfall record on December 10, with 1.6 inches (40 millimeters).
River flooding was ongoing on December 11, with the Skagit River and Snohomish River seeing record or near-record flood levels that day. Floodwater and mudslides have closed numerous roadways, including the eastbound lanes of I-90 out of western Washington.
NASA’s Disasters Response Coordination System has been activated to support the ongoing response efforts by the Washington State Emergency Operations Center. The team will be posting maps and data products on its open-access mapping portal as new information becomes available.
NASA Earth Observatory images by Lauren Dauphin, using GEOS data from the Global Modeling and Assimilation Office at NASA GSFC. Story by Kathryn Hansen.
References & Resources- Cliff Mass Weather Blog (2025, December 8) The Torrent Has Begun: The Philippine Connection. Accessed December 11, 2025.
- National Water Center, via X (2025, December 10) Key Messages for Pacific Northwest Flooding. Accessed December 11, 2025.
- National Weather Service (2025, December 11) Miscellaneous Hydrological Data. Accessed December 11, 2025.
- NOAA (2025, February 21) What are atmospheric rivers? Accessed December 11, 2025.
- USA Today (2025, December 11) Catastrophic flooding sparks evacuations in Washington state. See forecast. Accessed December 11, 2025.
- The Washington Post (2025, December 8) A 7,000-mile atmospheric river is stretching from Philippines to the U.S. Accessed December 11, 2025.
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NASA Selects Two Heliophysics Missions for Continued Development
NASA has selected one small explorer mission concept to advance toward flight design and another for an extended period of concept development.
NASA’s Science Mission Directorate Science Management Council selected CINEMA (Cross-scale Investigation of Earth’s Magnetotail and Aurora) to enter Phase B of development, which includes planning and design for flight and mission operations. The principal investigator for the CINEMA mission concept is Robyn Millan from Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire.
The proposed CINEMA mission aims to advance our understanding of how plasma energy flows into the Earth’s magnetosphere. This highly dynamic convective flow is unpredictable — sometimes steady and sometimes explosive — driving phenomena like fast plasma jets, global electrical current systems, and spectacular auroral displays.
“The CINEMA mission will help us to research magnetic convection in Earth’s magnetosphere — a critical piece of the puzzle in understanding why some space weather events are so influential, such as causing magnificent aurora displays and impacts to ground- and space-based infrastructure, and others seem to fizzle out,” said Joe Westlake, director of the Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Using multiple, multi-point measurements to improve predictions of these impacts on humans and technology across the solar system is a key strategy for the future of heliophysics research.”
The CINEMA mission’s constellation of nine small satellites will investigate the convective mystery using a combination of instruments — an energetic particle detector, an auroral imager, and a magnetometer — on each spacecraft in a polar low Earth orbit. By relating the energetic particles observed in this orbit to simultaneous auroral images and local magnetic field measurements, CINEMA aims to connect energetic activity in Earth’s large-scale magnetic structure to the visible signatures like aurora that we see in the ionosphere. The mission has been awarded approximately $28 million to enter Phase B. The total cost of the mission, not including launch, will not exceed $182.8 million. Phase B will last 10 months, and if selected, the mission would launch no earlier than 2030.
NASA also selected the proposed CMEx (Chromospheric Magnetism Explorer) mission for an extended Phase A study. This extended phase is for the mission to assess and refine their design for potential future consideration. The principal investigator for the CMEx mission concept study is Holly Gilbert from the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. The cost of the extended Phase A, which will last 12 months, is $2 million.
The CMEx concept is a proposed single-spacecraft mission that would use proven UV spectropolarimetric instrumentation that has been demonstrated during NASA’s CLASP (Chromospheric Layer Spectropolarimeter) sub-orbital sounding rocket flight. Using this heritage hardware, CMEx would be able to diagnose lower layers of the Sun’s chromosphere to understand the origin of solar eruptions and determine the magnetic sources of the solar wind.
The proposed missions completed a one-year early concept study in response to the 2022 Heliophysics Explorers Program Small-class Explorer (SMEX) Announcement of Opportunity.
“Space is becoming increasingly more important and plays a role in just about everything we do,” said Asal Naseri, acting associate flight director for heliophysics at NASA Headquarters. “These mission concepts, if advanced to flight, will improve our ability to predict solar events that could harm satellites that we rely on every day and mitigate danger to astronauts near Earth, at the Moon, or Mars.”
To learn more about NASA heliophysics missions, visit:
https://science.nasa.gov/heliophysics
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Abbey Interrante / Karen Fox
Headquarters, Washington
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abbey.a.interrante@nasa.gov / karen.c.fox@nasa.gov
