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Venus on Earth: NASA’s VERITAS Science Team Studies Volcanic Iceland

September 20, 2023
With its crushing atmospheric pressure, clouds of sulfuric acid, and searing surface temperature, Venus is an especially challenging place to study. But scientists know that observing its surface can provide key insights into the habitability and evolution of rocky planets like our own. So to get a global perspective of Venus while staying well above its hellish atmosphere, NASA’s VERITAS (Venus…
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NASA to Discuss Optical Communications Demo Riding With Psyche

September 16, 2023
NASA will host a media teleconference at 1 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, Sept. 20, to discuss the agency’s first test of high-bandwidth optical communications beyond the Moon. The Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) technology demonstration is launching aboard the Psyche…
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NASA-Built Greenhouse Gas Detector Moves Closer to Launch

September 15, 2023
A state-of-the-art imaging spectrometer, which will measure the greenhouse gases methane and carbon dioxide from space, moved closer to launch this month after being delivered to a clean room at Planet Labs PBC (Planet) in San Francisco. Designed and built by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, this science instrument will be part of an effort led by the nonprofit Carbon…
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NASA Scientists Test New Tool for Tracking Algal Blooms

September 8, 2023
By the time they were over, a series of massive algal blooms along the west coast of Florida in 2020 would be linked to some 2,000 tons of dead marine life around Tampa Bay. The human costs were stark, too, including a double-digit increase in asthma cases in Sarasota and…
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NASA’s Psyche Mission on Track for Liftoff Next Month

September 7, 2023
The spacecraft’s solar arrays are folded like an envelope into their stowed position. Xenon gas – fuel for the journey to the asteroid belt – is loaded. All four thrusters have passed their final tests. Engineers have confirmed the massive high-gain antenna is set to…
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NASA’s Oxygen-Generating Experiment MOXIE Completes Mars Mission

September 7, 2023
When the first astronauts land on Mars, they may have the descendants of a microwave-oven-size device to thank for the air they breathe and the rocket propellant that gets them home. That device, called MOXIE (Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment), has generated oxygen for the 16th and final time aboard NASA’s Perseverance rover. After the instrument proved far more successful…
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NASA Maps Key Heat Wave Differences in Southern California

August 23, 2023
Like much of the planet, Southern California is expected to experience more heat waves in the future due to Earth’s changing climate. And some of these will feel increasingly humid, as long-term forecasts call for muggy spells more typically associated with Florida or eastern Texas. To begin to understand what these changes could mean across the greater Los Angeles area, scientists at NASA’s…
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