Thailand brings NASA air quality data down to earth

Screenshot of the SERVIR-Mekong hub Air Quality Explorer app. Which can be downloaded here: http://aqatmekong-servir.adpc.net/en/mapviewer/

Molly Porter, NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center

For decades, NASA has used the vantage point of space, combined with airborne and ground-based field campaigns, to decipher the impact of air pollution and help other agencies protect people when unhealthy air threatens the places they live, work, and play. Now, government agencies in Thailand are harnessing the power of NASA air quality data and expertise through a unique partnership with SERVIR.

SERVIR, a Spanish word meaning “to serve,” is a joint initiative between NASA and the United States Agency for International Development to boost environmental resilience and decision-making in developing regions around the world. Through its network of regional hubs, SERVIR puts publicly available satellite imagery, geospatial data, and analysis tools into the hands of local decision-makers to help solve their most pressing environmental challenges. The SERVIR-Mekong hub, located at the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center in Bangkok, serves countries in the Mekong River Basin.

SERVIR-Mekong launched its new Air Quality Explorer app with Thailand's pollution control department and space agency Nov. 23 in Bangkok. (Credits: NASA/USAID/SERVIR-Mekong)

To improve air pollution monitoring in Thailand and the lower-Mekong River region, SERVIR-Mekong brought together experts in air quality measurement, technology design, atmospheric modelling, and civic engagement. They include the Royal Thai Government’s Pollution Control Department and Geo-Informatics and Space Technology Development Agency–Thailand's space agency. Together, they developed a web-based platform for tracking and forecasting air quality in the region.

"Through SERVIR we’re proud to support the Royal Thai Government’s Pollution Control Department in using satellite observations and model outputs to monitor and forecast air quality in Thailand," said Lawrence Friedl, director of NASA's Applied Sciences Program. "Partnerships and collaboration are how we create greater on-the-ground impacts that benefit lives on Earth."

SERVIR-Mekong's new Air Quality Explorer tool, introduced Nov. 23 at an event in Bangkok, features some major advances over past pollution monitoring systems. The new app combines NASA satellite data, ground-sensor data, and machine-learning techniques to enable large-scale monitoring and forecasting of air quality for the first time in Thailand. Previous systems relied heavily on ground-based technology.

While sensors on the ground can pinpoint local sources of pollution, satellites have proven essential for filling in missing data to provide consistent, near-real time, maps of pollution hotspots that would otherwise be invisible. Satellite observations help scientists and decision-makers see the bigger picture of how air pollution is distributed across the region and how it changes over time.

"Poor air quality is a seasonal problem in Thailand that has persisted for over a decade," said Steven Olive, mission director of USAID's Regional Development Mission for Asia. "In addition to providing Thailand with more accurate air pollution readings, this tool also has the potential to address the transboundary challenges that air pollution poses to the region."

Some of the major sources of pollution, including agricultural burning and forest fires, are a pervasive problem for much of Southeast Asia. Particle pollution becomes worse each year during the dry season, when monsoon rains retreat and colder temperatures and calm winds create favorable conditions for particles to accumulate and linger in the air for a longer period.

Intense smog resulting in unseasonably poor air quality in early 2019 revealed a need for readily available, reliable, and accessible pollution data. Since then, SERVIR-Mekong has put their user-driven development and science expertise to work to improve both monitoring and public awareness. In addition to launching the new tool, the team has held trainings to equip users and even challenged student-innovators to become part of the solution.

"We have stepped into the world of technology," said Athapol Charoenshunsa, director general of Thailand’s Pollution Control Department. "We look at and understand the world from space through satellite technology. Not only the past and the present, we shall also tell everyone in the future to prepare for environmental pollution properly and effectively."

Building on the success of the Air Quality Explorer in Thailand, SERVIR-Mekong aims to expand the effort to cover other countries that make up the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in the future.

 

More about SERVIR

NASA and USAID launched the SERVIR-Mekong hub in 2015 at the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center to serve the countries of Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. The partnership chiefly supports the development of services to address challenges related to regional water, food security, weather and climate, and land cover and land use.

Established in 2005, SERVIR is also improving awareness, increasing access to information, and supporting data-driven decision-making to help people in West Africa, Eastern and Southern Africa, Hindu Kush-Himalaya, and South America manage environmental challenges.

The International Space Station: 20 Years of Communications Excellence

The Zarya module in orbit around Earth. This image shows the International Space Station together with the space shuttle, the vehicle that helped build the complex. The picture was the first taken of a shuttle docked to the station from the perspective of a Russian Soyuz spacecraft. On May 23, 2011, the Soyuz carried Russian cosmonaut Dmitry Kondratyev, NASA astronaut Cady Coleman, and European Space Agency astronaut Paolo Nespoli back to Earth. Once their vehicle was about 600 feet from the station, Mission Control Moscow, outside the Russian capital, commanded the orbiting laboratory to rotate 130 degrees. This move allowed Nespoli to capture digital photographs and high definition video of the space shuttle Endeavour docked to the station. (Credit: NASA)

By Danny Baird NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

For 20 years, NASA has maintained a continuous human presence in space. The International Space Station — a marvel of cooperative engineering, science, and research — has made this incredible feat possible. Throughout the mission, NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) networks have connected station astronauts with loved ones on Earth and empowered profound research on the orbiting laboratory.

“As we celebrate 20 years of science and research aboard the station, we also celebrate the mission-enabling support infrastructure that makes it all possible,” said Robyn Gatens, acting director of the International Space Station at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Space communications has always been a vital piece of NASA’s crewed missions in low-Earth orbit and beyond.”

Construction of the International Space Station in orbit began on Nov. 20, 1998, when the Zayra Module launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Since then, the orbiting laboratory has been expanded and upgraded to meet the needs of astronauts living on the station and the science objectives of the mission.

Since Nov. 2, 2000, the space station has been occupied continuously by astronauts from NASA and international space organizations. The million-pound spacecraft has an internal pressurized volume equal that of a Boeing 747, providing living space for six-months long expedition crews of six people, while sometimes hosting up to 13 during crew rotations and shuttle visits.

NASA’s communications networks have made construction and occupation of the station possible. The station primarily relies on the constellation of Tracking and Data Relay Satellites (TDRS) and associated ground antennas. The orbiting laboratory sends its data to TDRS in geosynchronous orbit, which then relay that data to ground antennas at the White Sands Complex in Las Cruces, New Mexico and the Guam Remote Ground Terminal.

The orbiting laboratory also has a backup communications system. A series of very-high frequency (VHF) antennas around the world can provide astronauts with voice-only communications in the unlikely event of an emergency.

“NASA’s relay satellites provide the space station with robust, comprehensive services that keep our astronauts connected with mission control at all times,” said Network Services Division Director Susan Chang. “In combination with the redundant VHF network, TDRS assures the continued success and safety of the station.”

While the constellation of TDRS now provides near-continuous communications to low-Earth-orbiting missions, that wasn’t always the case. Until 1998, TDRS in two nodes provided coverage for 85% of the station’s orbit. NASA closed that “zone of exclusion” with the construction of the remote ground terminal in Guam, allowing communications with the station while over the Indian Ocean.

NASA continued to enhance the services that TDRS can provide the space station. Technicians have updated the space station’s software-based modem, improved data processors at various NASA centers, and enhanced routers, interfaces and other equipment and software at the ground stations. These modernization efforts have gradually increased the amount of data NASA can downlink from the station.

In 2016, the agency doubled the data per second that the station can transmit to 300 megabits per second. In 2019, NASA doubled the data rate again to 600 megabits per second — faster than most household fiber optic connections.

“The space station was designed in the 1990s. Recall our way of life then. A typical internet service provider had people to ‘dial up’ to get access to use of the internet. As the space station evolved with ever-advancing instruments, space communications evolved with timely innovations,” said SCaN Mission Commitment Manager John Hudiburg. “Investments in the ground segment have allowed us to keep pace with these needs, delivering more data to mission operations centers than ever before.”

Throughout its history, the space station has also served as a hub for communications research and development. From 2012 to 2019, the SCaN Testbed provided communications engineers with a platform to study space-based applications of software-defined radios. The Testbed researched innovations like cognitive communications, space-based GPS, and Ka-band communications.

The station has also tested revolutionary optical communications technologies that use infrared lasers to exceed data-rates offered by comparable radio systems. The Optical Payload for Lasercomm Science proved the practicality space-to-ground optical communications. The upcoming Laser Communications Relay Demonstration (LCRD) — launching in early 2021 — will test TDRS-like applications of optical communications with the station with the Integrated LCRD Low-Earth Orbit User Modem and Amplifier Terminal (ILLUMA-T). When operational, ILLUMA-T will complete the first end-to-end optical communications space relay system ever built.

In communications outreach, the space station has reached young people worldwide through amateur, or ham, radio. Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) organizes contacts between astronauts on the station and students, encouraging them to pursue STEM interests and careers. ARISS is also celebrating its 20 year anniversary this year on Nov. 13.

Looking to the future, NASA is exploring opportunities to utilize commercialize communications services for the station. Rather than exclusively using government-owned relay satellites and ground stations, NASA’s SCaN program is aiming to demonstrate communication services provided by industry to supply the orbiting laboratory with additional bandwidth and to make those services available to other space users. Utilizing commercial infrastructure could mean lower costs and more robust services while bolstering the commercial space economy.

To learn more about SCaN visit: www.nasa.gov/SCaN

Nov. 20, 1998, was a day to mark in history. The Russian Space Agency, now known as Roscosmos, launched a Proton rocket that lifted the pressurized module called Zarya, or “sunrise,” into orbit. This launch would truly be the dawn of the largest international cooperation effort in space to ever come to light. Zarya was the first piece of the International Space Station. Also known as the Functional Cargo Block (FGB), it would provide a nucleus of orientation control, communications and electrical power while the station waited for its other elements, including the Zvezda service module and Unity. (Credits: NASA)

Artist's concept of a Tracking and Data Relay (TDRS) satellite in orbit around the Earth. TDRS have long provided robust communications services to near-Earth NASA missions like the International Space Station. (Credits: NASA)

NASA's Perseverance Rover passes midway point to Mars

NASA's Mars 2020 Perseverance rover reached its halfway point – 146.3 million miles (235.4 million kilometers) – on its journey to Jezero Crater on Oct. 27, 2020, at 1:40 p.m. PDT (4:40 EDT). (Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

DC Agle & Grey Hautaluoma / Alana Johnson

Sometimes half measures can be a good thing – especially on a journey this long. The agency's latest rover only has about 146 million miles left to reach its destination.

NASA's Mars 2020 Perseverance rover mission has logged a lot of flight miles since being lofted skyward on July 30 – over 146.3 million miles (235.4 million kilometers). Turns out that is the same distance it has to go before the spacecraft hits the Red Planet's atmosphere like a 11,900 mph (19,000 kph) freight train on Feb. 18, 2021.

"At 1:40 p.m. Pacific Time October 27, our spacecraft had just as many miles in its metaphorical rearview mirror as it did out its metaphorical windshield," said Julie Kangas, a navigator working on the Perseverance rover mission at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. "While I don't think [there will be cake], especially since most of us are working from home, it's still a pretty neat milestone. Next stop, Jezero Crater."

The Sun's gravitational influence plays a significant role in shaping not just spacecraft trajectories to Mars (as well as to everywhere else in the solar system), but also the relative movement of the two planets. So Perseverance's route to the Red Planet follows a curved trajectory rather than an arrow-straight path.

"Although we're halfway into the distance we need to travel to Mars, the rover is not halfway between the two worlds," Kangas explained. "In straight-line distance, Earth is 26.6 million miles [42.7 million kilometers] behind Perseverance and Mars is 17.9 million miles [28.8 million kilometers] in front."

At the current distance, it takes 2 minutes, 22 seconds for a transmission to travel from mission controllers at JPL via the Deep Space Network to the spacecraft. By time of landing, Perseverance will have covered 292.5 million miles (470.8 million kilometers), and Mars will be about 130 million miles (209 million kilometers) away from Earth; at that point, a transmission will take about 11.5 minutes to reach the spacecraft.

Work Continues En Route

The mission team continues to check out spacecraft systems big and small during interplanetary cruise. Perseverance's RIMFAX and MOXIE instruments were tested and determined to be in good shape on Oct. 15. MEDA got a thumbs up on Oct. 19. There was even a line item to check the condition of the X-ray tube in the PIXL instrument on Oct. 16, which also went as planned.

"If it is part of our spacecraft and electricity runs through it, we want to confirm it is still working properly following launch," said Keith Comeaux, deputy chief engineer for the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover mission. "Between these checkouts – along with charging the rover's and Mars Helicopter's batteries, uploading files and sequences for surface operations, and planning for and executing trajectory correction maneuvers – our plate is full right up to landing."

More About the Mission

A key objective of Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust).

Subsequent missions, currently under consideration by NASA in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these cached samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis.

The Mars 2020 mission is part of a larger program that includes missions to the Moon as a way to prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet. Charged with returning astronauts to the Moon by 2024, NASA will establish a sustained human presence on and around the Moon by 2028 through NASA's Artemis lunar exploration plans.

JPL, which is managed for NASA by Caltech in Pasadena, California, built and manages operations of the Perseverance and Curiosity rovers.

For more information about NASA's Mars missions, go to:

https://www.nasa.gov/mars

NASA's OSIRIS-REx Spacecraft Goes for Early Stow of Asteroid Sample

This illustration shows NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft stowing the sample it collected from asteroid Bennu on Oct. 20, 2020. The spacecraft is using its Touch-And-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism (TAGSAM) arm to place the TAGSAM collector head into the Sample Return Capsule (SRC). (Credits: NASA/University of Arizona, Tucson)

NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission performed an early stow on Tuesday, Oct. 27, of the large sample it collected from the surface of the asteroid Bennu to protect and return as much of the sample as possible.

On Oct. 22, the OSIRIS-REx mission team received images that showed the spacecraft’s collector head overflowing with material collected from Bennu’s surface – well over the two-ounce (60-gram) mission requirement – and that some of these particles appeared to be slowly escaping from the collection head, called the Touch-And-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism (TAGSAM).

A mylar flap on the TAGSAM allows material to easily enter the collector head, and should seal shut once the particles pass through. However, larger rocks that didn’t fully pass through the flap into the TAGSAM appear to have wedged this flap open, allowing bits of the sample to leak out.

Because the first sample collection event was so successful, NASA’s Science Mission Directorate has given the mission team the go-ahead to expedite sample stowage, originally scheduled for Nov. 2, in the spacecraft’s Sample Return Capsule (SRC) to minimize further sample loss.

"The abundance of material we collected from Bennu made it possible to expedite our decision to stow,” said Dante Lauretta, OSIRIS-REx principal investigator at the University of Arizona, Tucson. “The team works around the clock to accelerate the stowage timeline, so that we can protect as much of this material as possible for return to Earth."

Unlike other spacecraft operations where OSIRIS-REx autonomously runs through an entire sequence, stowing the sample is done in stages and requires the team’s oversight and input. The team sends the preliminary commands to the spacecraft to start the stow sequence and, once OSIRIS-REx completes each step in sequence, the spacecraft sends telemetry and images back to the team on Earth and waits for the team’s confirmation to proceed with the next step.

Signals currently take just over 18.5 minutes to travel between Earth and the spacecraft one-way, so each step of the sequence factors in about 37 minutes of communications transit time. Throughout the process, the mission team continually assesses the TAGSAM’s wrist alignment to ensure the collector head is properly placed in the SRC. A new imaging sequence also has been added to the process to observe the material escaping from the collector head and verify that no particles hinder the stowage process. The mission anticipates the entire stowage process will take multiple days, at the end of which the sample will be safely sealed in the SRC for the spacecraft’s journey back to Earth.

“I’m proud of the OSIRIS-REx team’s amazing work and success to this point,” said NASA’s Associate Administrator for Science Thomas Zurbuchen. “This mission is well positioned to return a historic and substantial sample of an asteroid to Earth, and they’ve been doing all the right things, on an expedited timetable, to protect that precious cargo.”

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, provides overall mission management, systems engineering and the safety and mission assurance for OSIRIS-REx. The University of Arizona, Tucson leads the mission’s science observation planning and data processing. Lockheed Martin Space in Denver built the spacecraft and is providing flight operations. Goddard and KinetX Aerospace, in Tempe, Arizona, are responsible for navigating the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft. OSIRIS-REx is the third mission in NASA’s New Frontiers Program, which is managed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, for the agency’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

Earth and Moon Once Shared a Magnetic Shield 1327, Protecting Their Atmospheres

The Earth and Moon, shown here in a composite of two images from the Galileo mission of the 1990s, have a long shared history. Billions of years ago, they had connected magnetic fields. (Credits: NASA/JPL/USGS)

Written by Elizabeth Landau NASA Headquarters

Four-and-a-half billion years ago, Earth’s surface was a menacing, hot mess. Long before the emergence of life, temperatures were scorching, and the air was toxic. Plus, as a mere toddler, the Sun bombarded our planet with violent outbursts of radiation called flares and coronal mass ejections. Streams of charged particles called the solar wind threatened our atmosphere. Our planet was, in short, uninhabitable.

But a neighboring shield may have helped our planet retain its atmosphere and eventually go on to develop life and habitable conditions. That shield was the Moon, says a NASA-led study in the journal Science Advances.

“The Moon seems to have presented a substantial protective barrier against the solar wind for the Earth, which was critical to Earth’s ability to maintain its atmosphere during this time,” said Jim Green, NASA’s chief scientist and lead author of the new study. “We look forward to following up on these findings when NASA sends astronauts to the Moon through the Artemis program, which will return critical samples of the lunar South Pole.”

A brief history of the Moon

The Moon formed 4.5 billion years ago when a Mars-sized object called Theia slammed into the proto-Earth when our planet was less than 100 million years old, according to leading theories. Debris from the collision coalesced into the Moon, while other remnants reincorporated themselves into the Earth. Because of gravity, the presence of the Moon stabilized the Earth’s spin axis. At that time, our planet was spinning much faster, with one day lasting only 5 hours.

And in the early days, the Moon was a lot closer, too. As the Moon’s gravity pulls on our oceans, the water is slightly heated, and that energy gets dissipated. This results in the Moon moving away from Earth at a rate of 1.5 inches per year, or about the width of two adjacent dimes. Over time, that really adds up. By 4 billion years ago, the Moon was three times closer to Earth than it is today – about 80,000 miles away, compared to the current 238,000 miles. At some point, the Moon also became “tidally locked,” meaning Earth sees only one side of it.

Scientists once thought that the Moon never had a long-lasting global magnetic field because it has such a small core. A magnetic field causes electrical charges to move along invisible lines, which bow down toward the Moon at the poles. Scientists have long known about Earth’s magnetic field, which creates the beautifully colored aurorae in the Arctic and Antarctic regions.

A magnetic field serves as a shield causing electrical charges to move along its invisible lines. Scientists have long known about Earth’s magnetic field, which causes the beautifully colored aurorae in the Arctic and Antarctic regions. The movement of liquid iron and nickel deep inside the Earth, still flowing because of the heat left over from Earth’s formation, generates the magnetic fields that make up a protective bubble surrounding Earth, the magnetosphere.

But thanks to studies of samples of the lunar surface from the Apollo missions, scientists figured out that the Moon once had a magnetosphere, too. Evidence continues to mount from samples that were sealed for decades and recently analyzed with modern technology.

Like Earth, the heat from the Moon’s formation would have kept iron flowing deep inside, although not for nearly as long because of its size.

“It’s like baking a cake: You take it out of the oven, and it’s still cooling off,” Green said. “The bigger the mass, the longer it takes to cool off.”

A magnetic shield

The new study simulates how the magnetic fields of the Earth and Moon behaved about 4 billion years ago. Scientists created a computer model to look at the behavior of the magnetic fields at two positions in their respective orbits.

At certain times, the Moon’s magnetosphere would have served as a barrier to the harsh solar radiation raining down on the Earth-Moon system, scientists write. That’s because, according to the model, the magnetospheres of the Moon and Earth would have been magnetically connected in the polar regions of each object. Importantly for the evolution of Earth, the high-energy solar wind particles could not completely penetrate the coupled magnetic field and strip away the atmosphere.

But there was some atmospheric exchange, too. The extreme ultraviolet light from the Sun would have stripped electrons from neutral particles in Earth’s uppermost atmosphere, making those particles charged and enabling them to travel to the Moon along the lunar magnetic field lines. This may have contributed to the Moon maintaining a thin atmosphere at that time, too. The discovery of nitrogen in lunar rock samples support the idea that Earth’s atmosphere, which is dominated by nitrogen, contributed to the Moon’s ancient atmosphere and its crust.

Scientists calculate that this shared magnetic field situation, with Earth and Moon’s magnetospheres joined, could have persisted from 4.1 to 3.5 billion years ago.

“Understanding the history of the Moon's magnetic field helps us understand not only possible early atmospheres, but how the lunar interior evolved,” said David Draper, NASA’s deputy chief scientist and study co-author. “It tells us about what the Moon's core could have been like -- probably a combination of both liquid and solid metal at some point in its history -- and that is a very important piece of the puzzle for how the Moon works on the inside.”

Over time, as the Moon’s interior cooled, our nearest neighbor lost its magnetosphere, and eventually its atmosphere. The field must have diminished significantly 3.2 billion years ago, and vanished by about 1.5 billion years ago. Without a magnetic field, the solar wind stripped the atmosphere away. This is also why Mars lost its atmosphere: Solar radiation stripped it away.

If our Moon played a role in shielding our planet from harmful radiation during a critical early time, then in a similar way, there may be other moons around terrestrial exoplanets in the galaxy that help preserve atmospheres for their host planets, and even contribute to habitable conditions, scientists say. This would be of interest to the field of astrobiology – the study of the origins of life and the search for life beyond Earth.

Human exploration can tell us more 

This modeling study presents ideas for how the ancient histories of Earth and Moon contributed to the preservation of Earth’s early atmosphere. The mysterious and complex processes are difficult to figure out, but new samples from the lunar surface will provide clues to the mysteries.

As NASA plans to establish a sustainable human presence on the Moon through the Artemis program, there may be multiple opportunities to test out these ideas. When astronauts return the first samples from the lunar South Pole, where the magnetic fields of the Earth and Moon connected most strongly, scientists can look for chemical signatures of Earth’s ancient atmosphere, as well as the volatile substances like water that were delivered by impacting meteors and asteroids. Scientists are especially interested in areas of the lunar South Pole that have not seen any sunlight at all in billions of years -- the “permanently shadowed regions” – because the harsh solar particles would not have stripped away volatiles.

Nitrogen and oxygen, for example, may have traveled from Earth to Moon along the magnetic field lines and gotten trapped in those rocks.

“Significant samples from these permanently shadowed regions will be critical for us to be able to untangle this early evolution of the Earth’s volatiles, testing our model assumptions,” Green said.

The other co-authors on the paper are Scott Boardsen from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County; and Chuanfei Dong from Princeton University in New Jersey.

NASA's Chandra opens treasure trove of cosmic delights

This selection of images of different kinds of light from various missions and telescopes have been combined to better understand the universe. Each composite image contains X-ray data from Chandra as well as other telescopes. The objects represent a range of different astrophysical objects and include the galaxy Messier 82, the galaxy cluster Abell 2744, the supernova remnant 1987A, the binary star system Eta Carinae, the Cartwheel galaxy, and the planetary nebula Helix Nebula. Credits: NASA/CXC/SAO, NASA/STScI, NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSC, ESO/NAOJ/NRAO, NRAO/AUI/NSF, NASA/CXC/SAO/PSU, and NASA/ESA

Molly Porter & Megan Watzke

Humanity has "eyes" that can detect all different types of light through telescopes around the globe and a fleet of observatories in space. From radio waves to gamma rays, this "multiwavelength" approach to astronomy is crucial to getting a complete understanding of objects in space.

This compilation gives examples of images from different missions and telescopes being combined to better understand the science of the universe. Each of these images contains data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory as well as other telescopes. Various types of objects are shown (galaxies, supernova remnants, stars, planetary nebulas), but together they demonstrate the possibilities when data from across the electromagnetic spectrum are assembled.

 

Top row, from left to right:

Messier 82, or M82, galaxy

Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC; Optical: NASA/STScI

Messier 82, or M82, is a galaxy that is oriented edge-on to Earth. This gives astronomers and their telescopes an interesting view of what happens as this galaxy undergoes bursts of star formation. X-rays from Chandra (appearing as blue - up & down - and pink - side to side) show gas in outflows about 20,000 light years long that has been heated to temperatures above ten million degrees by repeated supernova explosions. Optical light data from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope (red and orange - center) shows the galaxy. 

Galaxy cluster Abell 2744

Credits: NASA/CXC; Optical: NASA/STScI

 

Galaxy clusters are the largest objects in the universe held together by gravity. They contain enormous amounts of superheated gas, with temperatures of tens of millions of degrees, which glows brightly in X-rays, and can be observed across millions of light years between the galaxies. This image of the Abell 2744 galaxy cluster combines X-rays from Chandra (diffuse blue emission) with optical light data from Hubble (red, green, and blue).

 

Supernova 1987A (SN 87A).

Credits: Radio: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), P. Cigan and R. Indebetouw; NRAO/AUI/NSF, B. Saxton; X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/PSU/K. Frank et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI

 

On February 24, 1987, observers in the southern hemisphere saw a new object in a nearby galaxy called the Large Magellanic Cloud. This was one of the brightest supernova explosions in centuries and soon became known as Supernova 1987A (SN 87A). The Chandra data (blue – outer ring) show the location of the supernova's shock wave — similar to the sonic boom from a supersonic plane — interacting with the surrounding material about four light years from the original explosion point. Optical data from Hubble (orange and red – inner rings) also shows evidence for this interaction in the ring.

Bottom row, from left to right:

Eta Carinae

Credits: NASA/CXC; Ultraviolet/Optical: NASA/STScI; Combined Image: NASA/ESA/N. Smith (University of Arizona), J. Morese (BoldlyGo Instituts) and A. Pagan

What will be the next star in our Milky Way galaxy to explode as a supernova? Astronomers aren't certain, but one candidate is in Eta Carinae, a volatile system containing two massive stars that closely orbit each other. This image has three types of light: optical data from Hubble (appearing as white center), ultraviolet (cyan – small band surrounding center) from Hubble, and X-rays from Chandra (appearing as purple emission – outer band surrounding both). The previous eruptions of this star have resulted in a ring of hot, X-ray emitting gas about 2.3 light years in diameter surrounding these two stars.

 

The Cartwheel galaxy

Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC; Optical: NASA/STScI

This galaxy resembles a bull's eye, which is appropriate because its appearance is partly due to a smaller galaxy that passed through the middle of this object. The violent collision produced shock waves that swept through the galaxy and triggered large amounts of star formation. X-rays from Chandra (purple) show disturbed hot gas initially hosted by the Cartwheel galaxy being dragged over more than 150,000 light years by the collision. Optical data from Hubble (red, green, and blue) show where this collision may have triggered the star formation.

The Helix nebula

Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC; Ultraviolet: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSC; Optical: NASA/STScI (M. Meixner)/ESA/NRAO (T.A. Rector); Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech/K. Su

 

When a star like the Sun runs out of fuel, it expands and its outer layers puff off, and then the core of the star shrinks. This phase is known as a "planetary nebula," and astronomers expect our Sun will experience this in about 5 billion years. This Helix Nebula image contains infrared data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope (green and red), optical light from Hubble (orange and blue), ultraviolet from NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (cyan), and Chandra's X-rays (appearing as white) showing the white dwarf star that formed in the center of the nebula. The image is about four light years across.

 

Three of these images — SN 1987A, Eta Carinae, and the Helix Nebula — were developed as part of NASA's Universe of Learning (UoL), an integrated astrophysics learning and literacy program, and specifically UoL's ViewSpace project. The UoL brings together experts who work on Chandra, the Hubble Space Telescope, Spitzer Space Telescope, and other NASA astrophysics missions.

NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center manages the Chandra program. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory's Chandra X-ray Center controls science from Cambridge Massachusetts and flight operations from Burlington, Massachusetts.

For more Chandra images, multimedia and related materials, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/chandra

 

Hubble provides holistic view of stars gone haywire

Hubble was recently retrained on NGC 6302, known as the “Butterfly Nebula,” to observe it across a more complete spectrum of light, from near-ultraviolet to near-infrared, helping researchers better understand the mechanics at work in its technicolor “wings” of gas. (Credits: NASA, ESA and J. Kastner (RIT))

NASA

As nuclear fusion engines, most stars live placid lives for hundreds of millions to billions of years. But near the end of their lives they can turn into crazy whirligigs, puffing off shells and jets of hot gas. Astronomers have employed Hubble’s full range of imaging capabilities to dissect such crazy fireworks happening in two nearby young planetary nebulas. NGC 6302 is dubbed the Butterfly Nebula because of its wing-like appearance. In addition, NGC 7027 resembles a jewel bug, an insect with a brilliantly colorful metallic shell.

The researchers have found unprecedented levels of complexity and rapid changes in jets and gas bubbles blasting off of the stars at the centers of both nebulas. Hubble is allowing the researchers to converge on an understanding of the mechanisms underlying the chaos.

“When I looked in the Hubble archive and realized no one had observed these nebulas with Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 across its full wavelength range, I was floored,” said Joel Kastner of Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, New York, leader of the new study. “These new multi-wavelength Hubble observations provide the most comprehensive view to date of both of these spectacular nebulas. As I was downloading the resulting images, I felt like a kid in a candy store.”

By examining this pair of nebulas with Hubble’s full, panchromatic capabilities — making observations in near-ultraviolet to near-infrared light — the team has had several “aha” moments. In particular, the new Hubble images reveal in vivid detail how both nebulas are splitting themselves apart on extremely short timescales — allowing astronomers to see changes over the past couple decades. Some of this rapid change may be indirect evidence of one star merging with its companion star.

“The nebula NGC 7027 shows emission at an incredibly large number of different wavelengths, each of which highlights not only a specific chemical element in the nebula, but also the significant, ongoing changes in its structure,” said Kastner. The research team also observed the Butterfly Nebula, which is a counterpart to the “jewel bug” nebula: Both are among the dustiest planetary nebulas known and both also contain unusually large masses of gas because they are so newly formed. This makes them a very interesting pair to study in parallel, say researchers.

Hubble’s broad multi-wavelength views of each nebula are helping the researchers to trace the nebulas’ histories of shock waves. Such shocks typically are generated when fresh, fast stellar winds slam into and sweep up more slowly expanding gas and dust ejected by the star in its recent past, generating bubble-like cavities with well-defined walls.

Researchers suspect that at the hearts of both nebulas are — or were — two stars circling around each other, like a pair of figure skaters. Evidence for such a central “dynamic duo” comes from the bizarre shapes of these nebulas. Each has a pinched, dusty waist and polar lobes or outflows, as well as other, more complex symmetrical patterns.

A leading theory for the generation of such structures in planetary nebulas is that the mass-losing star is one of two stars in a binary system. The two stars orbit one another closely enough that they eventually interact, producing a gas disk around one or both stars. The disk is the source of outflowing material directed in opposite directions from the central star.

Similarly, the smaller star of the pair may merge with its bloated, more rapidly evolving stellar companion. This also can create outflowing jets of material that may wobble over time. This creates a symmetric pattern, perhaps like the one that gives NGC 6302 its “butterfly” nickname. Such outflows are commonly seen in planetary nebulas.

“The suspected companion stars in NGC 6302 and NGC 7027 haven’t been directly detected because they are next to, or perhaps have already been swallowed by, larger red giant stars, a type of star that is hundreds to thousands of times brighter than the Sun,” said team member Bruce Balick of the University of Washington in Seattle. “The hypothesis of merging stars seems the best and simplest explanation for the features seen in the most active and symmetric planetary nebulas. It’s a powerful unifying concept, so far without rival.”

The Butterfly Nebula

Imagine a lawn sprinkler spinning wildly, tossing out two S-shaped streams. At first it appears chaotic, but if you stare for a while, you can trace its patterns. The same S-shape is present in the Butterfly Nebula, except in this case it is not water in the air, but gas blown out at high speed by a star. And the “S” only appears when captured by the Hubble camera filter that records near-infrared emission from singly ionized iron atoms.

“The S-shape in the iron emission from the Butterfly Nebula is a real eye-opener,” Kastner said. The S-shape directly traces the most recent ejections from the central region, since the collisions within the nebula are particularly violent in these specific regions of NGC 6302. “This iron emission is a sensitive tracer of energetic collisions between slower winds and fast winds from the stars,” Balick explained. “It’s commonly observed in supernova remnants and active galactic nuclei, and outflowing jets from newborn stars, but is very rarely seen in planetary nebulas.”

“The fact that the iron emission is only showing up along these opposing, off-center directions implies that the source of the fast flows is wobbling over time, like a spinning top that’s about to fall,” added Kastner. “That’s another tell-tale sign of the presence of a disk, which directs the flow, and also a binary companion.”

The ‘Jewel Bug’ Nebula

The planetary nebula NGC 7027 had been slowly puffing away its mass in quiet, spherically symmetric or perhaps spiral patterns for centuries — until relatively recently. “In some respects, the changes within this nebula are even more dramatic than those within the Butterfly,” Kastner said. “Something recently went haywire at the very center, producing a new cloverleaf pattern, with bullets of material shooting out in specific directions.”

The research team’s new images of NGC 7027 show emission from singly ionized iron that closely resembles observations made by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory in 2000 and 2014 as part of earlier research by Kastner, team member Rodolfo Montez Jr. of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, and collaborators. The iron emission traces the southeast-to-northwest-oriented outflows that also produce the X-ray-emitting shocks imaged by Chandra. “We have a sneaking suspicion that this nebula is a great example of what happens when a red giant star abruptly swallows a companion,” Montez Jr. said.

Recently, NGC 7027’s central star was identified in a new wavelength of light — near-ultraviolet — for the first time by using Hubble’s unique capabilities. This object, which resembles a colorful jewel bug, is a visibly diffuse region of gas and dust that may be the result of ejections by closely orbiting binary stars that were first slowly sloughing off material over thousands of years, and then entered a phase of more violent and highly directed mass ejections. (Credits: NASA, ESA and J. Kastner (RIT))

NASA astronauts launch from America in historic test flight of SpaceX Crew Dragon

 

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft launches from Launch Complex 39A on NASA’s SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station with NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley onboard, Saturday, May 30, 2020, at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

NASA

For the first time in history, NASA astronauts have launched from American soil in a commercially built and operated American crew spacecraft on its way to the International Space Station. The SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft carrying NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley lifted off at 3:22 p.m. EDT Saturday, May 30, on the company’s Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

“Today a new era in human spaceflight begins as we once again launched American astronauts on American rockets from American soil on their way to the International Space Station, our national lab orbiting Earth,” said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine.

NASA astronauts Robert Behnken, foreground, and Douglas Hurley, wearing SpaceX spacesuits, are seen as they depart the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building.

“I thank and congratulate Bob Behnken, Doug Hurley, and the SpaceX and NASA teams for this significant achievement for the United States. The launch of this commercial space system designed for humans is a phenomenal demonstration of American excellence and is an important step on our path to expand human exploration to the Moon and Mars.”

Known as NASA’s SpaceX Demo-2, the mission is an end-to-end test flight to validate the SpaceX crew transportation system, including launch, in-orbit, docking and landing operations. This is SpaceX’s second spaceflight test of its Crew Dragon and its first test with astronauts aboard, which will pave the way for its certification for regular crew flights to the station as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.

“This is a dream come true for me and everyone at SpaceX,” said Elon Musk, chief engineer at SpaceX. “It is the culmination of an incredible amount of work by the SpaceX team, by NASA and by a number of other partners in the process of making this happen. You can look at this as the results of a hundred thousand people roughly when you add up all the suppliers and everyone working incredibly hard to make this day happen.”

The program demonstrates NASA’s commitment to investing in commercial companies through public-private partnerships and builds on the success of American companies, including SpaceX, already delivering cargo to the space station.

“It’s difficult to put into words how proud I am of the people who got us here today,” said Kathy Lueders, NASA’s Commercial Crew Program manager. “When I think about all of the challenges overcome – from design and testing, to paper reviews, to working from home during a pandemic and balancing family demands with this critical mission – I am simply amazed at what the NASA and SpaceX teams have accomplished together. This is just the beginning; I will be watching with great anticipation ... through every phase of this historic mission.”

NASA astronaut Douglas Hurley waves as he and fellow crew member Robert Behnken depart the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building for Launch Complex 39A to board the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft for the Demo-2 mission launch, Saturday, May 30, 2020, at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

SpaceX controlled the launch of the Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy’s Launch Control Center Firing Room 4, the former space shuttle control room, which SpaceX has leased as its primary launch control center. As Crew Dragon ascended into space, SpaceX commanded the spacecraft from its mission control center in Hawthorne, California. NASA teams are monitoring space station operations throughout the flight from Mission Control Center at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

The SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft docked to the space station at 10:29 a.m. Sunday, May 31. Behnken and Hurley will work with SpaceX mission control to verify the spacecraft is performing as intended by testing the environmental control system, the displays and control system, and by maneuvering the thrusters, among other things.

The first docking maneuver began Saturday, May 30, at 4:09 p.m., and the spacecraft began its close approach to the station at about 8:27 a.m. Sunday, May 31. Crew Dragon is designed to dock autonomously, but the crews onboard the spacecraft and the space station diligently monitor the performance of the spacecraft as it approaches and docks to the forward port of the station’s Harmony module.

After successfully docking, the crew were welcomed aboard the International Space Station, where they became members of the Expedition 63 crew, which currently includes NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy. The crew will perform tests on Crew Dragon in addition to conducting research and other tasks with the space station crew.

Demo-2 Astronauts

Behnken is the joint operations commander for the mission, responsible for activities such as rendezvous, docking and undocking, as well as Demo-2 activities while the spacecraft is docked to the space station. He was selected as a NASA astronaut in 2000 and has completed two space shuttle flights. Behnken flew STS-123 in March 2008 and STS-130 in February 2010, performing three spacewalks during each mission.

Hurley is the spacecraft commander for Demo-2, responsible for activities such as launch, landing and recovery. He was selected as an astronaut in 2000 and has completed two spaceflights. Hurley served as pilot and lead robotics operator for both STS127 in July 2009 and STS135, the final space shuttle mission, in July 2011.

Mission Objectives

The Demo-2 mission is the final major test before NASA’s Commercial Crew Program certifies Crew Dragon for operational, long-duration missions to the space station. As SpaceX’s final flight test, it will validate all aspects of its crew transportation system, including the Crew Dragon spacecraft, spacesuits, Falcon 9 launch vehicle, launch pad 39A and operations capabilities.

While en route to the station, Behnken and Hurley took control of Crew Dragon for two manual flight tests, demonstrating their ability to control the spacecraft should an issue with the spacecraft’s automated flight arise. On Saturday, May 30, while the spacecraft coasted, the crew tested its roll, pitch and yaw. When Crew Dragon was about 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) below the station and moving around to the docking axis, the crew conducted manual in-orbit demonstrations of the control system in the event it were needed. After pausing, rendezvous resumed and mission managers made a final decision about whether to proceed to docking as Crew Dragon approached 20 meters (66 feet).

For operational missions, Crew Dragon will be able to launch as many as four crew members at a time and carry more than 220 pounds of cargo, allowing for an increased number crew members aboard the space station and increasing the time dedicated to research in the unique microgravity environment, as well as returning more science back to Earth.

The Crew Dragon being used for this flight test can stay in orbit about 110 days, and the specific mission duration will be determined once on station based on the readiness of the next commercial crew launch. The operational Crew Dragon spacecraft will be capable of staying in orbit for at least 210 days as a NASA requirement.

At the conclusion of the mission, Behnken and Hurley will board Crew Dragon, which will then autonomously undock, depart the space station, and re-enter Earth’s atmosphere. Upon splashdown off Florida’s Atlantic coast, the crew will be picked up by the SpaceX recovery ship and returned to the dock at Cape Canaveral.

NASA’s Commercial Crew Program is working with SpaceX and Boeing to design, build, test and operate safe, reliable and cost-effective human transportation systems to low-Earth orbit. Both companies are focused on test missions, including abort system demonstrations and crew flight tests, ahead of regularly flying crew missions to the space station. Both companies’ crewed flights will be the first times in history NASA has sent astronauts to space on systems owned, built, tested and operated by private companies.

Learn more about NASA’s Commercial Crew program at:

https://www.nasa.gov/commercialcrew

(Photo Credits: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

NASA Science keeps the lights on

Across NASA’s many missions, thousands of scientists, engineers, and other experts and professionals all over the country are doing what they do best, but now from home offices and via video conferencing. With most personnel supporting missions remotely to keep onsite staff at a minimal level in response to COVID-19, the Agency is moving ahead strongly with everything from space exploration to using our technology and innovation to help inform policy makers.

NASA is studying whether there are long-term responses from our planet caused by changes in human activity patterns due to COVID-19 quarantines. In the short-term, our satellites provide objective, accurate, and timely information on national and global food supplies that will help support USDA, USAID, and the global agencies that oversee food security. Scientists can track air quality changes, such as the drop in nitrogen dioxide, a major air pollutant, over major metropolitan areas around the world. Seeing Earth’s lights at night also helps researchers track patterns in energy use and human activity around the planet.

Responding to the White House’s call to action to develop new technology and data mining approaches that could help the research community address COVID-19 science questions, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California used artificial intelligence and natural language technologies to extract medical diagnoses, medical conditions, and drug and disease information from a database of 25,000+ publications. The information helps shed light on transmission, incubation, and environmental stability of the virus; what has been published about medical care for those affected; what we know about COVID-19 risk factors; and what we know about non-pharmaceutical interventions. The data was made available to the research community on March 23.

NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley, will use its supercomputer to crunch extremely complex and high volumes of data to help with COVID-19. The center’s supercomputers are part of the White House’s COVID-19 High Performance Computing Consortium to provide COVID-19 researchers with access to the world’s most powerful high-performance computing resources that can significantly advance the pace of scientific discovery in the fight to stop the virus. The sophisticated computing can process massive numbers of calculations related to bioinformatics, epidemiology and molecular modeling, helping scientists develop answers to complex scientific questions about COVID-19 in hours or days versus weeks or months. To aid in the COVID-19 response, NASA is opening access to the full portion of its supercomputing resources reserved for national priorities outside of the agency’s aeronautics and space research and exploration scope. This includes storage and providing support to help researchers to port their applications to NASA computing systems, run their applications, troubleshoot any issues and address any other requested support, including visualization.

NASA is exploring additional ways to leverage its expertise and capabilities to help with the national COVID-19 response. Employees can submit ideas for solutions relevant to COVID-19 via an internal crowdsourcing website. The call for ideas focuses on urgent needs related to personal protective equipment, ventilation devices, and monitoring and forecasting the spread and impacts of the virus, but any idea is welcome. Multiple ideas may be selected for follow-up and potential action.

While we leverage our technical expertise and technology to help provide important COVID-19 information, we continue our exploration of the solar system and beyond.

The interagency Community Coordinated Modeling Center continues to support and protect NASA robotic missions by monitoring space weather. We’re also monitoring the sun 24 hours a day, seven days a week with our missions like the Solar Dynamics Observatory and the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory. We’re also keeping an eye on asteroids, detecting and characterizing near-earth objects zooming by.

For asteroids much farther out, OSIRIS-REx is gearing up for its close approach of Bennu on April 14, using Natural Feature Tracking (NFT) optical navigation flying to a range of about 125 meters from the surface, followed by the final low-altitude (about 250 meter) reconnaissance flyover of the backup Osprey sample site on May 26.

Recently, the Mars Curiosity science team conducted its first “drilling while teleworking” activity. The team, while working remotely, controlled the rover in digging a hole in “Edinburgh,” a target on the top of the Greenheugh Pediment to learn more about the capping material that was a layer covering a large portion of Gail crater but now only remains in a few places.

Juno’s next close flyby of Jupiter is slated for April 10 with the spacecraft at a specially designed attitude to increase particle measurements over the planet’s aurora. During this close flyby, known as PJ-26, or Perijove-26, scientists hope they will get measurements to help answer key questions about how Jupiter’s aurora work and compare with Earth’s aurora.

With Hubble reaching its 30th year in space on April 24, the team is about to kick off the annual peer review of science proposals competing for Hubble observing time in the coming year. While the review usually involves astronomers all over the world gathering at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, this review will be held via videoconference. NASA’s other operating Great Observatory, Chandra, continues to study objects across the universe. In the last few weeks, the observatory has collected X-ray data on Supernova 1987A and a developing galaxy cluster 10 billion light years away, among many other targets. Chandra also will soon observe a possible magnetar, a neutron star with an extraordinarily strong magnetic field, discovered on March 10th. Chandra’s annual peer review will be held in June with participants joining remotely.  The James Webb Space Telescope will continue its integration and testing at Northrop Grumman in California with a reduced staff until Deployable Tower Assembly set up in April.

Science data continues to roll in from the International Space Station, including from NICER, with the instrument maintaining its twice a week target plans. The NICER operation team is taking target of opportunity requests from the community.  A few of the highlights over the past two weeks include the detection of a glitch in a magnetar that NICER discovered three weeks ago and the discovery that a recent X-ray transient is actually a neutron star binary system with eclipses.  In addition, NICER has just begun its second Guest Observer Cycle where it is providing data to outside teams that won competitively selected time.

Although health advisories have grounded NASA’s airborne Earth Science research campaigns temporarily, its 15 Earth-observing satellite missions and six instruments on the International Space Station are operating without disruption, tracking the natural and human-driven changes of our home planet, as well as beginning to gather data on variations resulting from human activity responding to COVID-19.

We continue to publish important research, such as a report released March 23 on the rate of retreat and shape of the ground underneath the Denman Glacier in East Antarctica. Scientists at JPL and the University of California, Irvine, analyzed radar data from four satellites from the Italian COSMO-SkyMed mission and found that the shape of ground beneath the ice sheet allows warm ocean water to flow underneath, leading to quicker and irreversible retreat and resulting in subsequent sea level rise.

NASA’s space biology research continues to study the basic workings of the human body and model organism analogs. Scientists are studying immune systems, bones, muscles, hearts – and even how our bodies interact with microorganisms in the unique environment of space. By studying how organisms respond to microgravity and other aspects of space, we increase our understanding of life on Earth and develop the knowledge needed to support long-term human habitation in space. This fundamental research is turning into better treatments for patients here on Earth. Platforms like NASA’s Rodent Research fly regularly to the International Space Station with commercial and academic experiments involving novel medicines and bone and muscle research.

In addition to continuing spacecraft operations, science data analysis continues across our missions, with significant publishing activity from NASA-funded researchers.  Our researchers collect and analyze data and collaborate with the interagency and international research community to address all aspects of NASA science. All data products are open and freely available via our network of online data centers and websites. Submitted research grant proposals and mission selections are being evaluated, chosen, and announced, with the agency stepping up to address online proposal submissions in the time of COVID-19 challenges.

From remote controlling spacecraft and gathering data, to managing mission operations and conducting research, NASA will keep working for the nation while protecting the health and safety of our workforce.

NASA outlines lunar surface sustainability concept

Infographic showing the evolution of lunar activities on the surface and in orbit.

When NASA sends astronauts to the surface of the Moon in 2024, it will be the first time outside of watching historical footage most people witness humans walking on another planetary body. Building on these footsteps, future robotic and human explorers will put in place infrastructure for a long-term sustainable presence on the Moon.

NASA recently proposed a plan to go from limited, short-term Apollo-era exploration of the 1960s, to a 21st Century plan in a report to the National Space Council. With the Artemis program, we will explore more of the Moon than ever before to make the next giant leap – sending astronauts to Mars.

“After 20 years of continuously living in low-Earth orbit, we’re now ready for the next great challenge of space exploration – the development of a sustained presence on and around the Moon,” said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. “For years to come, Artemis will serve as our North Star as we continue to work toward even greater exploration of the Moon, where we will demonstrate key elements needed for the first human mission to Mars.”

On the surface, the core elements for a sustained presence would include an emphasis on mobility to allow astronauts to explore more of the Moon and conduct more science:

* A lunar terrain vehicle or LTV, would transport crew around the landing zone.

* The habitable mobility platform would enable crews to take trips across the Moon lasting up to 45 days.

* A lunar foundation surface habitat would house as many as four crew members on shorter surface stays.

Astronauts working on the lunar surface also could test advanced robotics, as well as a wide set of new technologies identified in the Lunar Surface Innovation Initiative, focusing on tech development in the areas such as of in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) and power systems. Rovers will carry a variety of instruments including ISRU experiments that will generate information on the availability and extraction of usable resources (e.g., oxygen and water). Advancing these technologies could enable the production of fuel, water, and/or oxygen from local materials, enabling sustainable surface operations with decreasing supply needs from Earth.

Another key difference from Apollo and Artemis will be use of the Gateway in lunar orbit, built with commercial and international partners. The lunar outpost will serve as a command and control module for surface expeditions and an office and home for astronauts away from Earth. Operating autonomously when crew is not present, it also will be a platform for new science and technology demonstrations around the Moon.

Over time, NASA and its partners will enhance the lunar Gateway’s habitation capabilities and related life support systems. Adding a large-volume deep space habitation element would allow astronauts to test capabilities around the Moon for long-duration deep space missions.

While the goal of Apollo was to land the first humans on the Moon, the Artemis program will use the Moon as a testbed for crewed exploration farther into the solar system, beginning with Mars. This is America’s Moon to Mars space exploration approach. A proposed multi-month split-crew operation at the Gateway and on the lunar surface would test the agency’s concept for a human mission to the Red Planet.

For such a mission, NASA envisions a four-person crew traveling to the Gateway and living aboard the outpost for a multi-month stay to simulate the outbound trip to Mars. Later, two crew members would travel to the lunar surface and explore with the habitable mobility platform, while the remaining two astronauts stay aboard Gateway. The four crew members are later reunited aboard the lunar outpost for another multi-month stay, simulating the return trip to Earth. This mission would be the longest duration human deep space mission in history and would be the first operational test of the readiness of our deep-space systems.

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