Spacecraft - Blog Posts

That’s a wrap! Thanks for all the great questions.

Follow Serena on Twitter at @AstroSerena and follow the International Space Station on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook to keep up with all the cool stuff happening on our orbital laboratory.

Hello Serena! I was wondering if given the chance would you be apart of a mission to mars in the near future, and if you could bring a personal item with you what would it be?

What does actually launching into space feel like?

Would you dance off with an alien? If so, what song would you dance off? :D

What's your opinion on astronaut food?

How did your perspective on Earth & humanity change from space?

Is the earth really as beautiful as they say from space?

After spending time in Antarctica, Underwater AND in Space, which would you say is your favorite?

Ever get a random craving for a food when in space?

Hi!! I’m a high school sophomore and I love the work NASA does! I’ve always wondered, what’s an astronaut’s first thought when leaving earth? What kind of experiences do you leave the expedition with? Thanks! :) - Lauren

What is it like floating in space?

You seem to have spent a lot of time in some pretty isolated locations during your career, what are some challenges to that? Was there anything you enjoyed about it?

Dear Dr. Serena M. Aunon Chancellor, There are numerous questions and queries related to space and its endless impacts on human mind, but among all of them, I want to know, if any how, there is some emergency or casualty in space so that we need to operate a surgery, in that situation, are we still able to perform any surgery in microgravity? Is it possible or not? Thanking you. Parmesh Kumar India

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

What is the real raw advice for someone wanting to pursue a career at NASA?

The return of the Dragon 🐉

One month ago, SpaceX’s Dragon capsule arrived at the International Space Station. Now it’s time for the Dragon to come home. The return trip, a crucial part of its mission, brings scientific hardware, data and experiments down to waiting researchers.

Check out a few of the pieces of research taking that ride back to Earth.

A cinematic look at life and science aboard the space station

You may one day get to experience the product of The ISS Experience. A team is creating a cinematic virtual reality (VR) film from footage taken during in space covering crew life, execution of science and the international partnerships involved on the space station.

Every week or so, footage is transferred from the camera onto solid state drives – an original and a backup – for storage and downlinking. One of each pair of drives returns to Earth for editing and production.

Seeking Alzheimer’s understanding in microgravity

Amyloid fibrils, a conglomeration of proteins that can build up in the body, are associated with a number of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases. The Amyloid Aggregation investigation assesses whether microgravity affects formation of these fibrils.

Samples exposed to microgravity are coming back to Earth using a facility that maintains a chilly temperature of -20°C. Teams on the ground must quickly retrieve the equipment and keep the samples at -20°C until they are analyzed.

The SPHERES return home

Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites, or SPHERES, are bowling-ball sized satellites used to study formation flying, control algorithms and material science.

First sent to the station in 2006, these satellites have been employed in a dozen different investigations.

The Dragon brings back hardware from two recent experiments that examined the behavior of fluids in microgravity, SPHERES Tether Slosh and SPHERES-Slosh.

From microgravity lab to manufacturing facility

The Fiber Optic Production investigation created optical fibers on the space station using a blend of materials called ZBLAN to see whether making the fibers in microgravity has advantages over the process used on Earth. ZBLAN optical fibers offer high bandwidth for the telecommunications industry, and potential applications for uses like laser surgery and environmental monitoring.

The fiber produced on the space station is coming to Earth for testing to help verify previous studies and guide future efforts to manufacture large volumes of such fiber in microgravity.

Read more about the science returning on Dragon here!

For daily updates, follow @ISS_Research, Space Station Research and Technology News or our Facebook. Follow the ISS National Lab for information on its sponsored investigations. For opportunities to see the space station pass over your town, check out Spot the Station.

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

5 Ways the Moon Landing Changed Life on Earth

When Neil Armstrong took his first steps on the Moon 50 years ago, he famously said “that’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” He was referring to the historic milestone of exploring beyond our own planet — but there’s also another way to think about that giant leap: the massive effort to develop technologies to safely reach, walk on the Moon and return home led to countless innovations that have improved life on Earth.

Armstrong took one small step on the lunar surface, but the Moon landing led to a giant leap forward in innovations for humanity.

Here are five examples of technology developed for the Apollo program that we’re still using today:

1. Food Safety Standards

As soon as we started planning to send astronauts into space, we faced the problem of what to feed them — and how to ensure the food was safe to eat. Can you imagine getting food poisoning on a spacecraft, hundreds of thousands of miles from home?

We teamed up with a familiar name in food production: the Pillsbury Company. The company soon realized that existing quality control methods were lacking. There was no way to be certain, without extensive testing that destroyed the sample, that the food was free of bacteria and toxins.

Pillsbury revamped its entire food-safety process, creating what became the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point system. Its aim was to prevent food safety problems from occurring, rather than catch them after the fact. They managed this by analyzing and controlling every link in the chain, from the raw materials to the processing equipment to the people handling the food.

Today, this is one of the space program’s most far-reaching spinoffs. Beyond keeping the astronaut food supply safe, the Hazard Analysis and Critical Point system has also been adopted around the world — and likely reduced the risk of bacteria and toxins in your local grocery store. 

2. Digital Controls for Air and Spacecraft

The Apollo spacecraft was revolutionary for many reasons. Did you know it was the first vehicle to be controlled by a digital computer? Instead of pushrods and cables that pilots manually adjusted to manipulate the spacecraft, Apollo’s computer sent signals to actuators at the flick of a switch.

Besides being physically lighter and less cumbersome, the switch to a digital control system enabled storing large quantities of data and programming maneuvers with complex software.

Before Apollo, there were no digital computers to control airplanes either. Working together with the Navy and Draper Laboratory, we adapted the Apollo digital flight computer to work on airplanes. Today, whatever airline you might be flying, the pilot is controlling it digitally, based on the technology first developed for the flight to the Moon.

3. Earthquake-ready Shock Absorbers

A shock absorber descended from Apollo-era dampers and computers saves lives by stabilizing buildings during earthquakes.

Apollo’s Saturn V rockets had to stay connected to the fueling tubes on the launchpad up to the very last second. That presented a challenge: how to safely move those tubes out of the way once liftoff began. Given how fast they were moving, how could we ensure they wouldn’t bounce back and smash into the vehicle?

We contracted with Taylor Devices, Inc. to develop dampers to cushion the shock, forcing the company to push conventional shock isolation technology to the limit.

Shortly after, we went back to the company for a hydraulics-based high-speed computer. For that challenge, the company came up with fluidic dampers—filled with compressible fluid—that worked even better. We later applied the same technology on the Space Shuttle’s launchpad.

The company has since adapted these fluidic dampers for buildings and bridges to help them survive earthquakes. Today, they are successfully protecting structures in some of the most quake-prone areas of the world, including Tokyo, San Francisco and Taiwan.

4. Insulation for Space

We’ve all seen runners draped in silvery “space blankets” at the end of marathons, but did you know the material, called radiant barrier insulation, was actually created for space?

Temperatures outside of Earth’s atmosphere can fluctuate widely, from hundreds of degrees below to hundreds above zero. To better protect our astronauts, during the Apollo program we invented a new kind of effective, lightweight insulation.

We developed a method of coating mylar with a thin layer of vaporized metal particles. The resulting material had the look and weight of thin cellophane packaging, but was extremely reflective—and pound-for-pound, better than anything else available.

Today the material is still used to protect astronauts, as well as sensitive electronics, in nearly all of our missions. But it has also found countless uses on the ground, from space blankets for athletes to energy-saving insulation for buildings. It also protects essential components of MRI machines used in medicine and much, much more.

Image courtesy of the U.S. Marines

5. Healthcare Monitors

Patients in hospitals are hooked up to sensors that send important health data to the nurse’s station and beyond — which means when an alarm goes off, the right people come running to help.

This technology saves lives every day. But before it reached the ICU, it was invented for something even more extraordinary: sending health data from space down to Earth.

When the Apollo astronauts flew to the Moon, they were hooked up to a system of sensors that sent real-time information on their blood pressure, body temperature, heart rate and more to a team on the ground.

The system was developed for us by Spacelabs Healthcare, which quickly adapted it for hospital monitoring. The company now has telemetric monitoring equipment in nearly every hospital around the world, and it is expanding further, so at-risk patients and their doctors can keep track of their health even outside the hospital.

Only a few people have ever walked on the Moon, but the benefits of the Apollo program for the rest of us continue to ripple widely.

In the years since, we have continued to create innovations that have saved lives, helped the environment, and advanced all kinds of technology.

Now we’re going forward to the Moon with the Artemis program and on to Mars — and building ever more cutting-edge technologies to get us there. As with the many spinoffs from the Apollo era, these innovations will transform our lives for generations to come.

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

We Like Big Rockets and We Cannot Lie: Saturn V vs. SLS

On this day 50 years ago, human beings embarked on a journey to set foot on another world for the very first time. 

At 9:32 a.m. EDT, millions watched as Apollo astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins lifted off from Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, flying high on the most powerful rocket ever built: the mighty Saturn V.

As we prepare to return humans to the lunar surface with our Artemis program, we’re planning to make history again with a similarly unprecedented rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS). The SLS will be our first exploration-class vehicle since the Saturn V took American astronauts to the Moon a decade ago. With its superior lift capability, the SLS will expand our reach into the solar system, allowing astronauts aboard our Orion spacecraft to explore multiple, deep-space destinations including near-Earth asteroids, the Moon and ultimately Mars.

So, how does the Saturn V measure up half a century later? Let’s take a look.

Mission Profiles: From Apollo to Artemis 

Saturn V

Every human who has ever stepped foot on the Moon made it there on a Saturn V rocket. The Saturn rockets were the driving force behind our Apollo program that was designed to land humans on the Moon and return them safely back to Earth.

Developed at our Marshall Space Flight Center in the 1960s, the Saturn V rocket (V for the Roman numeral “5”)  launched for the first time uncrewed during the Apollo 4 mission on November 9, 1967. One year later, it lifted off for its first crewed mission during Apollo 8. On this mission, astronauts orbited the Moon but did not land. Then, on July 16, 1969, the Apollo 11 mission was the first Saturn V flight to land astronauts on the Moon. In total, this powerful rocket completed 13 successful missions, landing humans on the lunar surface six times before lifting off for the last time in 1973.

Space Launch System (SLS) 

Just as the Saturn V was the rocket of the Apollo generation, the Space Launch System will be the driving force behind a new era of spaceflight: the Artemis generation.

During our Artemis missions, SLS will take humanity farther than ever before. It is the vehicle that will return our astronauts to the Moon by 2024, transporting the first woman and the next man to a destination never before explored – the lunar South Pole. Over time, the rocket will evolve into increasingly more powerful configurations to provide the foundation for human exploration beyond Earth’s orbit to deep space destinations, including Mars.

SLS will take flight for the first time during Artemis 1 where it will travel 280,000 miles from Earth – farther into deep space than any spacecraft built for humans has ever ventured.

Size: From Big to BIGGER 

Saturn V

The Saturn V was big. 

In fact, the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center is one of the largest buildings in the world by volume and was built specifically for assembling the massive rocket. At a height of 363 feet, the Saturn V rocket was about the size of a 36-story building and 60 feet taller than the Statue of Liberty!

Space Launch System (SLS)

Measured at just 41 feet shy of the Saturn V, the initial SLS rocket will stand at a height of 322 feet. Because this rocket will evolve into heavier lift capacities to facilitate crew and cargo missions beyond Earth’s orbit, its size will evolve as well. When the SLS reaches its maximum lift capability, it will stand at a height of 384 feet, making it the tallest rocket in the world.

Power: Turning Up the Heat 

Saturn V

For the 1960s, the Saturn V rocket was a beast – to say the least.

Fully fueled for liftoff, the Saturn V weighed 6.2 million pounds and generated 7.6 million pounds of thrust at launch. That is more power than 85 Hoover Dams! This thrust came from five F-1 engines that made up the rocket’s first stage. With this lift capability, the Saturn V had the ability to send 130 tons (about 10 school buses) into low-Earth orbit and about 50 tons (about 4 school buses) to the Moon.

Space Launch System (SLS)

Photo of SLS rocket booster test

Unlike the Saturn V, our SLS rocket will evolve over time into increasingly more powerful versions of itself to accommodate missions to the Moon and then beyond to Mars.

The first SLS vehicle, called Block 1, will weigh 5.75 million pounds and produce 8.8 million pounds of thrust at time of launch. That’s 15 percent more than the Saturn V produced during liftoff! It will also send more than 26 tons  beyond the Moon. Powered by a pair of five-segment boosters and four RS-25 engines, the rocket will reach the period of greatest atmospheric force within 90 seconds!

Following Block 1, the SLS will evolve five more times to reach its final stage, Block 2 Cargo. At this stage, the rocket will provide 11.9 million pounds of thrust and will be the workhorse vehicle for sending cargo to the Moon, Mars and other deep space destinations. SLS Block 2 will be designed to lift more than 45 tons to deep space. With its unprecedented power and capabilities, SLS is the only rocket that can send our Orion spacecraft, astronauts and large cargo to the Moon on a single mission.

Build: How the Rockets Stack Up

Saturn V

The Saturn V was designed as a multi-stage system rocket, with three core stages. When one system ran out of fuel, it separated from the spacecraft and the next stage took over. The first stage, which was the most powerful, lifted the rocket off of Earth’s surface to an altitude of 68 kilometers (42 miles). This took only 2 minutes and 47 seconds! The first stage separated, allowing the second stage to fire and carry the rest of the stack almost into orbit. The third stage placed the Apollo spacecraft and service module into Earth orbit and pushed it toward the Moon. After the first two stages separated, they fell into the ocean for recovery. The third stage either stayed in space or crashed into the Moon.

Space Launch System (SLS)

Much like the Saturn V, our Space Launch System is also a multi-stage rocket. Its three stages (the solid rocket boosters, core stage and upper stage) will each take turns thrusting the spacecraft on its trajectory and separating after each individual stage has exhausted its fuel. In later, more powerful versions of the SLS, the third stage will carry both the Orion crew module and a deep space habitat module.

A New Era of Space Exploration 

Just as the Saturn V and Apollo era signified a new age of exploration and technological advancements, the Space Launch System and Artemis missions will bring the United States into a new age of space travel and scientific discovery.

Join us in celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing and hear about our future plans to go forward to the Moon and on to Mars by tuning in to a special two-hour live NASA Television broadcast at 1 p.m. ET on Friday, July 19. Watch the program at www.nasa.gov/live.

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

Six Things You Need to Know About the Green Propellant Infusion Mission

Next week, we’re launching a new “green” fuel to space for the first time! The Green Propellant Infusion Mission (GPIM)—which consists of a non-toxic liquid, compatible propulsion system and the small satellite it’s riding on—will demonstrate how our technology works so that future missions can take advantage of this safer, more efficient fuel alternative.

Here are six key facts to know about our Green Propellant Infusion Mission:

1) The Air Force Research Lab developed the “green” fuel. 

The AFRL’s hydroxyl ammonium nitrate fuel/oxidizer blend—called AF-M315E—is actually peach in color. This liquid doesn’t require the kind of strict, handling protocols that conventional chemicals currently require. Think shirtsleeves instead of hazmat suits, which could reduce pre-launch ground processing time for a spacecraft from weeks to days!

Image Credit: Air Force Research Lab

2) It’s safer and more efficient.

The non-toxic fuel offers nearly 50% better performance when compared to today’s highly toxic chemical propellant, hydrazine. That’s equivalent to getting 50% more miles per gallon on your car. This means spacecraft can travel farther or operate for longer with less propellant in their fuel tanks. 

3) The fuel can handle extreme temperatures.

Even on missions to extremely cold environments, such as the south pole of Mars – where temperatures can dip as low as -225 degrees Fahrenheit and carbon-dioxide ice “spiders” can form (see below) – AF-M315E won’t freeze, but rather just transforms into a glass transition phase. This means even though it turns into a solid, it won’t cause spacecraft components to stretch or expand, so the spacecraft only has to warm up the fuel when it needs it.

4) Industry is already lining up to use the technology.

Our commercial partners report that there is a lot of interest and potential for this tech. After we successfully prove how it works in space, small satellites to large spacecraft could benefit by using the green propellant system. It’d only be a matter of time before companies begin building the new systems for market.

5) GPIM required a team of talented engineers.

Engineers at Aerojet Rocketdyne in Redmond, Washington developed new, optimized hardware like thrusters, tanks, filters and valves to work with the green fuel. GPIM uses a set of thrusters that fire in different scenarios to test engine performance and reliability. 

Ball Aerospace of Boulder, Colorado designed and built the mini fridge-sized spacecraft bus and pieced it all together.

Before being ready for flight, GPIM components went through rigorous testing at multiple NASA centers including our Glenn Research Center, Goddard Space Flight Center and Kennedy Space Center. The program team at Marshall Space Flight Center manages the mission. Once in orbit, researchers will work together to study how the fuel is performing as they manipulate the spacecraft. The demonstration mission will last about 13 months.

6) GPIM will hitch a ride on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket.

SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket will launch for a third time for the U.S. Department of Defense’s Space Test Program-2 (STP-2) mission targeted for June 24, 2019 at 11:30 p.m. EDT. With nearly two dozen other satellites from government, military and research institutions, GPIM will deploy within a few hours after launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The SpaceX Falcon Heavy launch will be live-streamed here: https://www.nasa.gov/live

Follow @NASA_Technology on Twitter for news about GPIM’s launch.

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NASA Tech Launching on the Falcon Heavy

Later this month, a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket will take to the skies for the third time to launch the Department of Defense’s Space Test Program-2 (STP-2) mission. Several exciting, one-of-a-kind NASA technology and science payloads are among the two-dozen spacecraft aboard.

First, let’s talk about that Falcon Heavy rocket. Its 27 engines generate thrust at liftoff equal to that of approximately 18 airplanes, and it can lift over 140,000 pounds.

Managed by the U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center, STP-2 is the first government-contracted Falcon Heavy launch. It will reuse the two side boosters recovered after the April flight. SpaceX describes it as one of the most challenging launches in the company’s history.

It’s a big deal to us at NASA because we’re launching some pretty cool technologies. The tech will support our future exploration plans by helping improve future spacecraft design and performance. Here’s a bit about each:

Deep Space Atomic Clock

Time is the heartbeat of space navigation. Today, we navigate in deep space by using giant antennas on Earth to send signals to spacecraft, which then send those signals back to Earth. Atomic clocks on Earth measure the time it takes a signal to make this two-way journey. Only then can human navigators on Earth use large antennas to tell the spacecraft where it is and where to go.

Our Jet Propulsion Laboratory has been perfecting an atomic clock fit for exploration missions. The Deep Space Atomic Clock is the first atomic clock designed to fly on a spacecraft destined for beyond Earth's orbit. The timepiece is lighter and smaller—no larger than a toaster oven—than its refrigerator-sized, Earthly counterparts.

This miniaturized clock could enable one-way navigation: a spacecraft receives a signal from Earth and can determine its location immediately using its own, built-in navigation system. Even smaller versions of the clock are being investigated right now that could be used for the growing number of small to mid-size satellites. As we go forward to the Moon with the Artemis program, precise measurements of time are key to mission success.

The Deep Space Atomic Clock is the primary payload onboard the General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems Orbital Test Bed satellite and will perform a year-long demonstration in space.

Enhanced Tandem Beacon Experiment (E-TBEx)

Two tiny satellites will study how signals can be muddled as they travel through hard-to-predict bubbles in the upper atmosphere. Signals sent from satellites down to Earth (and vice versa) can be disrupted by structured bubbles that sometimes form in Earth's upper atmosphere. Because this region is affected both by weather on Earth and conditions in space, it's hard to predict just when these bubbles will form or how they'll mess with signals.

The E-TBEx CubeSats (short for Enhanced Tandem Beacon Experiment) will try to shed some light on that question. As these little satellites fly around Earth, they'll send radio signals (like the ones used by GPS) to receiving stations on the ground. Scientists will be able to look at the signals received and see if they were jumbled as they traveled through the upper atmosphere down to Earth — which will help us track when these bubbles are forming and how much they're interfering with our signals.

Green Propellant Infusion Mission (GPIM)

For decades, we have relied on a highly toxic spacecraft fuel called hydrazine. The Green Propellant Infusion Mission (GPIM) will lay the foundation to replace conventional chemical propulsion systems with a safer and more efficient alternative for next-generation spacecraft.

GPIM will demonstrate a new propellant in space for the first time. Concocted by the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, this innovative, “green” fuel—which actually has more of a peach hue—is expected to improve overall spacecraft performance due to its higher density, increased thrust and lower freezing point in comparison with hydrazine.

GPIM’s propulsion system, developed by Aerojet Rocketdyne, consists of new compatible tanks, valves and thrusters. During the two-month-long demonstration on a Ball Aerospace spacecraft, engineers will conduct orbital maneuvers to demonstrate the performance of the propellant and propulsion system.

Space Environment Testbeds (SET)

It’s not easy being a spacecraft; invisible, energetic particles zip throughout space — and while there are so few that space is considered a vacuum, what’s there still packs a punch. Tiny particles — like those seen here impacting a detector on a Sun-studying spacecraft — can wreak havoc with the electronics we send up into space.

Space Environment Testbeds — or SET, for short — is a mission to study space radiation and how it affects spacecraft and electronics in orbit. What looks like snow flurries in these animated images, for example, is actually a solar radiation storm of incredibly fast particles, unleashed by a solar eruption. Energetic particles from the Sun or deep space can spark memory damage or computer upsets on spacecraft, and over time, degrade hardware.

By studying radiation effects and different methods to protect satellites, SET will help future missions improve spacecraft design, engineering and operations.

Follow @NASA_Technology and @NASASun on Twitter for news about the STP-2 launch and our missions aboard.

Check out www.nasa.gov/spacex to stay up-to-date on the launch day and time. Don’t forget to tune into our launch coverage, scheduled to start about 30 minutes before liftoff!

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

How We’re Accelerating Our Missions to the Moon

Our Space Launch System isn’t your average rocket. It is the only rocket that can send our Orion spacecraft, astronauts and supplies to the Moon. To accomplish this mega-feat, it has to be the most powerful rocket ever built. SLS has already marked a series of milestones moving it closer to its first launch, Artemis.

Here are four highlights you need to know about — plus one more just on the horizon.

Counting Down

Earlier this month, Boeing technicians at our Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans successfully joined the top part to the core stage with the liquid hydrogen tank. The core stage will provide the most of the power to launch Artemis 1. Our 212-foot-tall core stage, the largest the we have ever built, has five major structural parts. With the addition of the liquid hydrogen tank to the forward join, four of the five parts have been bolted together. Technicians are finishing up the final part — the complex engine section — and plan to bolt it in place later this summer.  

Ready to Rumble

This August, to be exact. That’s when the engines for Artemis 1 will be added to the core stage. Earlier this year, all the engines for the first four SLS flights were updated with controllers, tested and officially cleared “go” for launch. We’ve saved time and money by modifying 16 RS-25 engines from the space shuttle and creating a more powerful version of the solid rocket boosters that launched the shuttle. In April, the last engine from the shuttle program finished up a four-year test series that included 32 tests at our Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. These acceptance tests proved the engines could operate at a higher thrust level necessary for deep space travel and that new, modernized flight controllers —the “brains” of the engine — are ready to send astronauts to the Moon in 2024.

Getting a Boost

Our industry partners have completed the manufacture and checkout of 10 motor segments that will power two of the largest propellant boosters ever built. Just like the engines, these boosters are designed to be fast and powerful. Each booster burns six tons of propellant every second, generating a max thrust of 3.6 million pounds for two minutes of pure awesome. The boosters will finish assembly at our Kennedy Space Center in Florida and readied for the rocket’s first launch in 2020. In the meantime, we are well underway in completing the boosters for SLS and Orion’s second flight in 2022.

Come Together

Meanwhile, other parts of the rocket are finished and ready for the ride to the Moon. The final piece of the upper part of the rocket, the launch vehicle stage adapter, will soon head toward Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Two other pieces, including the interim cryogenic propulsion stage that will provide the power in space to send Orion on to the Moon, have already been delivered to Kennedy.

Looking to the Future

Our engineers evaluated thousands of designs before selecting the current SLS rocket design. Now, they are performing critical testing and using lessons learned from current assembly to ensure the initial and future designs are up to the tasks of launching exploration missions for years to come. This real-time evaluation means engineers and technicians are already cutting down on assembly time for future mission hardware, so that we and our partners can stay on target to return humans to the Moon by 2024 — to stay so we can travel on to Mars.

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Three Ways to Travel at (Nearly) the Speed of Light

One hundred years ago, Einstein’s theory of general relativity was supported by the results of a solar eclipse experiment. Even before that, Einstein had developed the theory of special relativity — a way of understanding how light travels through space.

Particles of light — photons — travel through a vacuum at a constant pace of more than 670 million miles per hour.

All across space, from black holes to our near-Earth environment, particles are being accelerated to incredible speeds — some even reaching 99.9% the speed of light! By studying these super fast particles, we can learn more about our galactic neighborhood. 

Here are three ways particles can accelerate:

1) Electromagnetic Fields!

Electromagnetic fields are the same forces that keep magnets on your fridge! The two components — electric and magnetic fields — work together to whisk particles at super fast speeds throughout the universe. In the right conditions, electromagnetic fields can accelerate particles at near-light-speed.

We can harness electric fields to accelerate particles to similar speeds on Earth! Particle accelerators, like the Large Hadron Collider and Fermilab, use pulsed electromagnetic fields to smash together particles and produce collisions with immense amounts of energy. These experiments help scientists understand the Big Bang and how it shaped the universe!

2) Magnetic Explosions!

Magnetic fields are everywhere in space, encircling Earth and spanning the solar system. When these magnetic fields run into each other, they can become tangled. When the tension between the crossed lines becomes too great, the lines explosively snap and realign in a process known as magnetic reconnection. Scientists suspect this is one way that particles — for example, the solar wind, which is the constant stream of charged particles from the Sun — are sped up to super fast speeds.

When magnetic reconnection occurs on the side of Earth facing away from the Sun, the particles can be hurled into Earth’s upper atmosphere where they spark the auroras.

3) Wave-Particle Interactions!

Particles can be accelerated by interactions with electromagnetic waves, called wave-particle interactions. When electromagnetic waves collide, their fields can become compressed. Charged particles bounce back and forth between the waves, like a ball bouncing between two merging walls. These types of interactions are constantly occurring in near-Earth space and are responsible for damaging electronics on spacecraft and satellites in space.

Wave-particle interactions might also be responsible for accelerating some cosmic rays from outside our solar system. After a supernova explosion, a hot, dense shell of compressed gas called a blast wave is ejected away from the stellar core. Wave-particle interactions in these bubbles can launch high-energy cosmic rays at 99.6% the speed of light.

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

Go green — in space!

Good things come in mini-fridge-sized packages. This small spacecraft is our Green Propellant Infusion Mission and will test a low toxicity propellant. This technology could lengthen mission durations by using less propellant.

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

3 … 2 … 1… ALOHA!

Sometimes in space, you have to set your clocks to island time and gather for a good Hawaiian shirt day. In this 2001 #TBT, Expedition Two and STS-100 crew members gather for a group photo with a pre-set digital still camera.

Clockwise from the 12 o'clock point in the circle are Kent V. Rominger, Yuri V. Lonchakov, Yury V. Usachev, Umberto Guidoni, James S. Voss, Jeffrey S. Ashby, Scott E. Parazynski, John L. Phillips and Chris A. Hadfield, with Susan J. Helms at center. Usachev, Helms and Voss are members of three Expedition Two crew, with the other seven serving as the STS-100 crew on the Space Shuttle Endeavour. Usachev and Lonchakov represent Rosaviakosmos; Guidoni is associated with the European Space Agency (ESA); and Hadfield is from the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

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The year is 1965, and thanks to telecommunication engineers at our Jet Propulsions Laboratory, the first color version of one of our first Martian images had been created. Brought to life by hand coloring numbered strips, this image is a true blast to the past.

Fast forward to the 21st century and our Mars InSight mission now enables us to gawk at the Martian horizon as if we were there. InSight captured this panorama of its landing site on Dec. 9, 2018, the 14th Martian day, or sol, of its mission. The 290-degree perspective surveys the rim of the degraded crater InSight landed in and was made up of 30 photos stitched together.

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High-Flying Spacecraft Finish 1000th Lap Around Earth!

The quadruplet spacecraft of the Magnetospheric Multiscale mission have just returned from their first adventure into the solar wind — sailing through the most intense winds of their journey so far.

These spacecraft were designed to study Earth’s giant magnetic system, which shields our planet from the majority of the Sun’s constant outflow of material — what we call the solar wind.

Usually, the Magnetospheric Multiscale spacecraft — MMS for short — take their measurements from inside Earth’s protective magnetic environment, the magnetosphere. But in February and March, the MMS spacecraft ventured beyond this magnetic barrier to measure that solar wind directly — a feat that meant they had to change up how they fly in a whole new way.

Outside of Earth's protective magnetic field, the spacecraft were completely immersed in the particles and magnetic fields of the solar wind. As they flew through the stream of material, the spacecraft traced out a wake behind each instrument, just like a boat in a river. To avoid measuring that wake, each spacecraft was tilted into the wind so the instruments could take clean measurements of the pristine solar wind, unaffected by the wake.

Within the magnetosphere, the MMS spacecraft fly in a pyramid-shaped formation that allows them to study magnetic fields in 3D. But to study the solar wind, the mission team aligned spacecraft in a straight line at oddly spaced intervals. This string-of-pearls formation gave MMS a better look at how much the solar wind varies over different scales.

Because the four spacecraft fly so close together, MMS relies on super-accurate navigation from GPS satellites. This venture into the solar wind took the spacecraft even farther from Earth than before, so MMS broke its own world record for highest-ever GPS fix. The spacecraft were over 116,000 miles above Earth — about halfway to the Moon — and still using GPS!

Now, just in time for the 1,000th orbit of their mission — which adds up to 163 million miles flown! — the spacecraft are back in Earth's magnetosphere, flying in their usual formation to study fundamental processes within our planet’s magnetic field.

Keep up with the latest MMS research at nasa.gov/mms, on Twitter @NASASun or with NASA Sun Science on Facebook.

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One Year Into Our Planet-Hunting TESS Mission

Our Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), launched last year on April 18, is completing a year in space, surveying the skies to find the closest, most exciting planets outside our solar system for further study. Worlds that TESS is hunting for include super-Earths, rocky planets, gas giants, and maybe even some Earth-sized planets — and much, much more! TESS is scanning the whole sky one section at a time, monitoring the brightness of stars for periodic dips caused by planets transiting (that is, passing in front of) those stars. So far, TESS has found 548 candidates and 10 confirmed exoplanets.

Since its launch, TESS has orbited Earth a total of 28 times. TESS has a unique elliptical orbit that circuits around Earth twice every time the Moon orbits. This allows TESS’s cameras to monitor each patch of sky continuously for nearly a month at a time. To get into this special orbit, TESS made a series of loops culminating in a lunar gravitational assist, which gave it the final push it needed.

Did you know that TESS has some serious mileage? The spacecraft has traveled about 20 million miles so far, which works out to an average of about 2,200 miles per hour. That’s faster than any roadrunner we’ve ever seen! This would be four times faster than an average jet. You’d get to your destination in no time!

TESS downloads data during its closest approach to Earth about every two weeks. So far, it has returned 12,000 gigabytes of data. That’s as if you streamed about 3,000 movies on Netflix. Get the popcorn ready! If you total all the pixels from every image taken using all four of the TESS cameras — which is about 600 full-frame images per orbit, you’d get about 805 billion pixels. This is like half a million iPhone screens put together!

When the Kepler Space Telescope reached the end of its mission, it passed the planet-finding torch to TESS. Where Kepler's view was deep — looking for planets as far away as 3,000 light-years — TESS's view is wide, surveying nearly the entire sky over two years. Each sector TESS views is 20 times larger than Kepler's field of view.

TESS will continue to survey the sky and is expected to find about 20,000 exoplanets in the two years it'll take to complete a scan of nearly the entire sky. Before TESS, several thousand candidate exoplanets were found, and more than 3,000 of these were confirmed. Some of these exoplanets are expected to range from small, rocky worlds to giant planets, showcasing the diversity of planets in the galaxy.

The TESS mission is led by MIT and came together with the help of many different partners. You can keep up with the latest from the TESS mission by following mission updates and keep track of the number of candidates and confirmed exoplanets.

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Spacewalk Reassignments: What’s the Deal?

On Friday, March 29, Christina Koch and Anne McClain were scheduled to perform a spacewalk together to upgrade the power systems of the International Space Station. It would have been the first all-female spacewalk in human history. While disappointing to many people, after the last spacewalk was completed on March 22, NASA changed the assignments to protect the safety of the crew and the timing of the mission. Now, Christina Koch and Nick Hague will be performing this upcoming spacewalk, leaving lots of people wondering: What’s the deal?

1. Why did the availability of spacesuit sizes affect the schedule?

Spacesuits are not “one size fits all.” We do our best to anticipate the spacesuit sizes each astronaut will need, based on the spacesuit size they wore in training on the ground, and in some cases astronauts train in multiple sizes.

McClain trained in both a medium and a large on Earth. However, living in microgravity can change the size of your body! In fact, Anne McClain has grown two inches since she launched to the Space Station.

McClain realized that the medium she wore during the March 22 spacewalk was a better fit for her in space. She had planned to wear a large during the March 29 spacewalk.

In a tweet, McClain explained: “This decision was based on my recommendation. Leaders must make tough calls, and I am fortunate to work with a team who trusts my judgement. We must never accept a risk that can instead be mitigated. Safety of the crew and execution of the mission come first.”

To provide each astronaut the best fitting spacesuit during their spacewalks, Koch will wear the medium torso on March 29, and McClain will wear it again on April 8.

2. Why is spacesuit sizing so important?

The spacesuit is a mini spaceship that keeps our astronauts alive while they are spacewalking!

Astronauts train several hours on Earth in the Neutral Buoyancy Lab for every hour they spend spacewalking. Spacewalks are the most physically demanding thing we ask astronauts to do, which is why an optimally fitted spacesuit is important to completing the assigned tasks and overall mission!

3. How come you don’t have enough spacesuits in the right size?

We do have enough torsos. The spacesuit takes into account more than 80 different body measurements to be configured for each astronaut. The suit has three sizes of upper torso, eight sizes of adjustable elbows, over 65 sizes of gloves, two sizes of adjustable waists, five sizes of adjustable knees and a vast array of padding options for almost every part of the body.

In space, we have two medium hard upper torsos, two larges and two extra larges; however, one of the mediums and one of the extra larges are spares that would require 12 hours of crew time for configuration.

Configuring the spare medium is a very methodical and meticulous process to ensure the intricate life support system — including the controls, seals, and hoses for the oxygen, water and power as well as the pressure garment components — are reassembled correctly with no chance of leaks. 

Nothing is more important than the safety of our crew!

12 hours might not seem like a long time, but the space station is on a very busy operational schedule. An astronaut's life in space is scheduled for activities in five minute increments. Their time is scheduled to conduct science experiments, maintain their spaceship and stay healthy (they exercise two hours a day to keep their bones and muscles strong!).

The teams don’t want to delay this spacewalk because two resupply spacecraft – Northrop Grumman Cygnus and SpaceX cargo Dragon – are scheduled to launch to the space station in the second half of April. That will keep the crew very busy for a while!

4. Why has there not already been an all-female spacewalk?

NASA does not make assignments based on gender.

The first female space shuttle commander, the first female space station commander and the first female spacewalker were all chosen because they the right individuals for the job, not because they were women. It is not unusual to change spacewalk assignments as lessons are learned during operations in space.

McClain became the 13th female spacewalker on March 22, and Koch will be the 14th this Friday – both coincidentally during Women’s History Month! Women also are filling two key roles in Mission Control: Mary Lawrence as the lead flight director and Jaclyn Kagey as the lead spacewalk officer.

5. When will the all-female spacewalk happen?

An all-female spacewalk is inevitable! As the percentage of women who have become astronauts increases, we look forward to celebrating the first spacewalk performed by two women! McClain, Koch (and Hague!) are all part of the first astronaut class that was 50 percent women, and five of the 11 members of the 2017 astronaut candidate class are also women.

You can watch the upcoming spacewalk on March 29 at 6:30 ET, which is one in a series to upgrade the station’s power technology with new batteries that store power from the solar arrays for the station to use when it is in orbital night.

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Five Facts About the Kepler Space Telescope That Will Blow You Away!

Ten years ago, on March 6, 2009, a rocket lifted off a launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. It carried a passenger that would revolutionize our understanding of our place in the cosmos--NASA’s first planet hunter, the Kepler space telescope. The spacecraft spent more than nine years in orbit around the Sun, collecting an unprecedented dataset for science that revealed our galaxy is teeming with planets. It found planets that are in some ways similar to Earth, raising the prospects for life elsewhere in the cosmos, and stunned the world with many other first-of-a-kind discoveries. Here are five facts about the Kepler space telescope that will blow you away:

Kepler observed more than a half million stars looking for planets beyond our solar system.

It discovered more than 2,600 new worlds…

…many of which could be promising places for life.

Kepler’s survey revealed there are more planets than stars in our galaxy.

The spacecraft is now drifting around the Sun more than 94 million miles away from Earth in a safe orbit.

NASA retired the Kepler spacecraft in 2018. But to this day, researchers continue to mine its archive of data, uncovering new worlds.

*All images are artist illustrations. Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Demo-1: What’s the Deal?

Whether or not you caught the SpaceX Crew Dragon launch this past weekend, here’s your chance to learn why this mission, known as Demo-1, is such a big deal.

The First of its Kind

Demo-1 is the first flight test of an American spacecraft designed for humans built and operated by a commercial company. 

Liftoff

The SpaceX Crew Dragon lifted off at 2:49 a.m. EST Saturday, March 2, on the company’s Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center. 

This was the first time in history a commercially-built American crew spacecraft and rocket launched from American soil. 

A New Era in Human Spaceflight

Upon seeing the arriving spacecraft, NASA astronaut Anne McClain snapped a photo from the International Space Station: “Welcome to a new era in human spaceflight.” 

Docking the Dragon

After making 18 orbits of Earth, the Crew Dragon spacecraft successfully attached to the International Space Station’s Harmony module at 5:51 a.m. EST Sunday, March 3. The Crew Dragon used the station’s new international docking adapter for the first time since astronauts installed it in August 2016. 

The docking phase, in addition to the return and recovery of Crew Dragon, are critical to understanding the system’s ability to support crew flights.

Opening the Hatch

After opening the hatch between the two spacecraft, the crewmates configured Crew Dragon for its stay. 

They installed a ventilation system that cycles air from Crew Dragon to the station, installed window covers and checked valves. After that, the crew was all set for a welcoming ceremony for the visiting vehicle. 

Ripley and Little Earth

Although the test is uncrewed, that doesn’t mean the Crew Dragon is empty. Along for the ride was Ripley, a lifelike test device outfitted with sensors to provide data about potential effects on future astronauts. (There is also a plush Earth doll included inside that can float in the microgravity!)

Inside the Dragon

For future operational missions, Crew Dragon will be able to launch as many as four crew members and carry more than 220 pounds of cargo. This will increase the number of astronauts who are able to live onboard the station, which will create more time for research in the unique microgravity environment.

Integration

Since the arrival of SpaceX Crew Dragon, the three Expedition 58 crew members have returned to normal operations (with some new additions to the team!) 

Undocking

The Crew Dragon is designed to stay docked to station for up to 210 days, although the spacecraft used for this flight test will remain docked to the space station for only five days, departing Friday, March 8. (We will be providing live coverage — don’t miss it!)

SpaceX and NASA

Elon Musk, CEO and lead designer at SpaceX, expressed appreciation for NASA’s support: “SpaceX would not be here without NASA, without the incredible work that was done before SpaceX even started and without the support after SpaceX did start.”

Preparation for Demo-2

NASA and SpaceX will use data from Demo-1 to further prepare for Demo-2, the crewed flight test that will carry NASA astronauts and Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken to the International Space Station. NASA will validate the performance of SpaceX’s systems before putting crew on board for the Demo-2 flight, currently targeted for July 2019.

Demo-1: So What?

Demo-1 is a big deal because it demonstrates NASA and commercial companies working together to advance future space exploration! With Demo-1’s success, NASA and SpaceX will begin to prepare to safely fly astronauts to the orbital laboratory.

Follow along with mission updates with the Space Station blog.

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