Eclipse Across America

The twin Voyager spacecraft, which launched in 1977, are our ambassadors to the rest of the Milky Way, destined to continue orbiting the center of our galaxy for billions of years after they stop communicating with Earth. On Aug. 25, 2012, Voyager 1 became the first human-made object to enter interstellar space, and Voyager 2 is expected to cross over in the next few years. At age 40, the Voyagers are the farthest and longest-operating spacecraft and still have plenty more to discover. This poster captures the spirit of exploration, the vastness of space and the wonder that has fueled this ambitious journey to the outer planets and beyond.

Enjoy this and other Voyager anniversary posters. Download them for free here: https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/downloads/

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

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What’s Up for March 2017?

What’s Up for March? The moon hides red star Aldebaran and crescents dazzle after dusk.

On March 4 the first quarter moon passes between Earth and the star Aldebaran, temporarily blocking our view of the star. This is called an occultation. 

The occultation begins and concludes at different times, depending on where you are when you view it.

The event should be easy to see from most of the U.S., Mexico, most of Central America, the Western Caribbean and Bermuda. 

Observers along a narrow path from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Hartford, Connecticut, will see the moon “graze” the star. The star will disappear and reappear repeatedly as hills and valleys on the moon alternately obscure and reveal it.

As seen from Earth, both Mercury and Venus have phases like our moon. That’s because they circle the sun inside Earth’s orbit. 

Planets that orbit between Earth and the sun are known as inner or inferior planets.

Inferior planets can never be at “opposition,” which is when the planet and the sun are on opposite sides of Earth.

But inferior planets can be at “conjunction,” which is when a planet, the sun and Earth are all in a straight line. 

Conjunction can happen once when the planet is on the opposite side of the sun from Earth and again when it’s on the same side of the sun as Earth. 

When a planet is on the opposite side of the sun from Earth, we say it is at “superior conjunction.” As the planet moves out from behind the sun and gets closer to Earth, we see less and less of the lit side. We see phases, similar to our moon’s phases. 

Mercury is at superior conjunction on March 6. 

A few weeks later, the planet emerges from behind the sun and we can once again observe it. By the end of March we’ll see a last-quarter Mercury.

 On April 20 Mercury reaches “inferior conjunction.”

Brilliant Venus is also racing toward its own inferior conjunction on March 25. Watch its crescent get thinner and thinner as the planet’s size appears larger and larger, because it is getting closer to Earth.

Finally, look for Jupiter to rise in the East. It will be visible all month long from late evening until dawn.

You can catch up on solar system missions and all of our missions at www.nasa.gov

Watch the full “What’s Up for March 2017″ video here: 

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Spinoffs: Space Station Innovations in Your Cart (and Heart!)

You might think NASA technology is just spaceships and telescopes, but did you know the camera in your cell phone is, too? It’s one of many NASA innovations now found everywhere on Earth.

The International Space Station has had crew living on it for 25 years straight. In that time, the space station has enabled a tremendous amount of research, helping NASA and scientists better understand long-term living in space – but it’s not just knowledge coming back down to Earth! Technologies developed for the space station and experiments conducted aboard the orbiting lab also benefit people on the planet below. Here are a few of these inventions, or spinoffs, you can find in your everyday life.

A Sunscreen That Blocks Radiation in Space – and on Your Face

After surviving for 18 months outside the International Space Station, an extremely hardy organism is now improving sunscreens and face cream products from a cosmetics company, which licensed use of the organism from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Build Muscle With or Without Gravity

Muscles atrophy quickly in space, so when astronauts began long stays on the International Space Station, they needed some specialized exercise equipment. A resistance mechanism made of a coiled metal spring formed the basis of the first way for astronauts to “lift weights” in space. Soon after, that same design became the heart of compact home gym equipment.

Fresh Greens Every Day of the Year

The need to grow fresh food in space pushed NASA to develop indoor agriculture techniques. Thanks to the agency’s research, private companies are building on NASA’s vertical farm structure, plant-growth “recipes,” and environmental-control data to create indoor farms, resulting in higher crop yields and better-quality produce while conserving water and energy and eliminating the need for pesticides.

Cultivating Hearts and Knees in Space

Gravity is a significant obstacle to bioprinting cells and growing human tissue on Earth because heavier components settle to the bottoms of petri dishes. In the absence of gravity, each cell layer stays in place, which is how it’s possible to grow heart and knee tissue on the space station. The same principle also allows mixing of complex pharmaceuticals on orbit.

Storing Oodles of Energy

NASA chose nickel-hydrogen batteries to power the Hubble Space Telescope and the International Space Station because the technology is safe, reliable in extreme temperatures, and long-lived. NASA’s improvements brought down the cost of the technology, which is now used by large-scale utilities and renewable power plants that need to store energy generated by intermittent sources.

You can read about many more products sourced from the ISS on spinoff.nasa.gov.

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How Big is Our Galaxy, the Milky Way?

When we talk about the enormity of the cosmos, it’s easy to toss out big numbers – but far harder to wrap our minds around just how large, how far and how numerous celestial bodies like exoplanets – planets beyond our solar system – really are.

So. How big is our Milky Way Galaxy?

We use light-time to measure the vast distances of space.

It’s the distance that light travels in a specific period of time. Also: LIGHT IS FAST, nothing travels faster than light.

How far can light travel in one second? 186,000 miles. It might look even faster in metric: 300,000 kilometers in one second. See? FAST.

How far can light travel in one minute? 11,160,000 miles. We’re moving now! Light could go around the Earth a bit more than 448 times in one minute.

Speaking of Earth, how long does it take light from the Sun to reach our planet? 8.3 minutes. (It takes 43.2 minutes for sunlight to reach Jupiter, about 484 million miles away.) Light is fast, but the distances are VAST.

In an hour, light can travel 671 million miles. We’re still light-years from the nearest exoplanet, by the way. Proxima Centauri b is 4.2 light-years away. So… how far is a light-year? 5.8 TRILLION MILES.

A trip at light speed to the very edge of our solar system – the farthest reaches of the Oort Cloud, a collection of dormant comets way, WAY out there – would take about 1.87 years.

Our galaxy contains 100 to 400 billion stars and is about 100,000 light-years across!

One of the most distant exoplanets known to us in the Milky Way is Kepler-443b. Traveling at light speed, it would take 3,000 years to get there. Or 28 billion years, going 60 mph. So, you know, far.

SPACE IS BIG.

Read more here: go.nasa.gov/2FTyhgH

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Concerning the new telescope -out of curiosity- what is the maximum distance it can view planets, galaxies, objects, anything up to -in terms of common/metric measurement, and/or years (if applicable) etc.? -Rose

Have you ever had to troubleshoot a problem in space?

Questions coming up from….

@maybeinanotherworld: JWST IS HAPPENING! How are all of you feeling about this?

@Anonymous: How powerful is this telescope, exactly?

@Anonymous: Why are the mirrors on it yellow?

@foeofcolor: How long is this estimated to last for? Like how long will it be able to function in space by estimates?

People of OSIRIS-REx

As OSIRIS-REx closes in on its target destination—asteroid Bennu—anticipation is building for the first-ever, close-up glimpse of this small world. It took thousands of people to come this far. Get to know a few members of the team:

1. Carl Hergenrother, Astronomy Working Group Lead & Strategic and Tactical Scientist

Job Location: University of Arizona, Tucson Expertise: Asteroids & Comets Time on mission: Since before there was a mission Age: 45 Hometown: Oakland, New Jersey

“When you’re observing Bennu with a telescope, you see it as a dot. … So when it actually becomes its own little world, it’s really exciting—and almost a little sad. Up until that point, it can be anything. And now, there it is and that’s it.”

2. Heather Roper, Graphic Designer

Job Location: University of Arizona, Tucson Job Title: Graphic Designer Expertise: Visual Communications Time on mission: 5 years Age: 25 Hometown: Tucson, Arizona

“I really like the challenge of visually depicting the science of the mission and getting to show people things that we can’t see.”

3. Jason Dworkin, Project Scientist

Job Location: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland Expertise: Origin-of-life Chemistry Time on mission: Since before there was a mission Age: 49 Hometown: Houston, Texas

"In 10th grade, I had to do a science fair project for biology class. … I wanted to expand on chemistry experiments from old journal papers; but that could have been dangerous. I got in touch with … a pioneering scientist in origin-of-life research and asked for advice. He was worried that I would accidentally injure myself, so he invited me into his lab . . . that helped set my career.”

4. Sara Balram Knutson, Science Operations Lead Engineer

Job Location: University of Arizona, Tucson Expertise: Aerospace Engineering Time on mission: 6 years Age: 31 Hometown: Vacaville, California

“My dad was in the Air Force, so I grew up being a bit of an airplane nerd. When I was in high school, I really liked math, science, and anything having to do with flight. I looked for a field where I could combine all those interests and I found aerospace engineering.”

5. Nancy Neal Jones, Public Affairs Lead

Job Location: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland Expertise: Science Communications Time on mission: 7 years Age: 51 Hometown: New York, New York

“We’re going to a pristine asteroid to take a sample to bring to Earth. This means that my children and grandchildren, if they decide to go into the sciences, may have an opportunity analyze the Bennu samples.”

6. Javier Cerna, Communications System Engineer

Job Location: Lockheed Martin Corporation, Littleton, Colorado Expertise: Electrical Engineering Time on mission: Since before there was a mission Age: 37 Hometown: Born in Mexico City, and raised in Los Angeles, and Las Cruces, New Mexico

“One thing we do is evaluate how strong the signal from the spacecraft is—kind of like checking the strength of the WiFi connection. Basically, we’re ensuring that the link from the spacecraft to the ground, and vice versa, stays strong.”

7. Jamie Moore, Contamination Control Engineer

Job Location: Lockheed Martin Corporation, Littleton, Colorado Expertise: Chemistry Time on mission: 5 years Age: 32 Hometown: Apple Valley, Minnesota & Orlando, Florida

“I was there for just about every deployment of the sampling hardware to make sure it was kept clean and to evaluate the tools engineers were using. I even went to Florida with the spacecraft to make sure it stayed clean until launch.”

8. Mike Moreau, Flight Dynamics System Manager

Job Location: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland; Littleton, Colorado Expertise: Mechanical and aerospace engineering Time on mission: 5 years Age: 47 Hometown: Swanton, Vermont

“I grew up on a dairy farm in Vermont, which is a world away from working for NASA. But I can trace a lot of my success as an engineer and a leader back to things that I learned on my dad’s farm.”

9. Johnna L. McDaniel, Contamination Control Specialist

Job Location: NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, Florida Expertise: Anti-Contamination Cleaning Time on Mission: 4 months Age: 53 Hometown: Cocoa, Florida

“The clothing requirements depend on the payload. With OSIRIS-Rex, we could not wear any items made with nylon. This was because they have amino acid-based polymers in them and would have contaminated the spacecraft. I even had a special bucket for mopping.”

10. Annie Hasten, Senior Financial Analyst

Job Location: Lockheed Martin Corporation, Steamboat Springs, Colorado Expertise: Business Time on Mission: 1.5 years Age: 30 Hometown: Littleton, Colorado

“I think it’s a pleasure to work with people who are so intensely passionate about their jobs. These engineers are doing their dream jobs, so you feed off of that positive energy.”

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A Q&A from the Space Station!

Did you miss it? Astronaut Scott Kelly answered questions over the weekend on People Magazine’s Facebook page! Anything and everything from his favorite food in space to his year aboard the International Space Station. 

Here are a few highlights from the conversation:

Follow Astronaut Scott Kelly during the remainder of his year in space: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram

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Top 10 Ways the Space Station is Helping Get Us to Mars

Believe it or not, the International Space Station is paving our way to Mars. Being the only microgravity laboratory in which long-duration investigations can take place, it provides deeper understanding of how the human body reacts to long-term spaceflight. Here are the top 10 ways the space station is helping us on our journey to the Red Planet:

10: Communication Delays

Have you ever sent a text and got frustrated when it took longer than 3 seconds to send? Imaging communicating from Mars where round-trip delays could take up to 31 minutes! Our Comm Delay Assessment studies the effects of delayed communications for interplanetary crews that have to handle medical and other emergencies in deep space.

9. Astronaut Functional Performance

After a long nights sleep, do you ever feel a bit clumsy when you first get out of bed? Imagine how crew members might feel after spending six months to a year in microgravity! Our Field Test investigation is working to understand the extend of physical changes in astronauts who live in space for long periods of time, with an aim toward improving recovery time and developing injury prevention methods for future missions.

8. Psychological Impacts of Isolation and Confinement

In order to study the behavioral issues associated with isolation and confinement, researchers evaluate the personal journals of space station crew members. These study results provide information to help prepare us for longer duration spaceflight.

7. Impacts on Vision

Did you know that long duration spaceflight can often cause changes to crew members’ vision? It can, and our Ocular Health study monitors microgravity-induced visual impairment, as well as changes believed to arise from elevated intracranial pressure. All of this work hopes to characterize how living in microgravity can affect the visual, vascular and central nervous systems.

6. Immune Responses

An important aspect of our journey to Mars is the need to understand how long-duration spaceflight affects they way crew members’ bodies defend agains pathogens. Our Integrated Immune investigation collects and analyzes blood, urine and saliva samples from crew members before, during and after spaceflight to monitor changes in the immune system.

5. Food for Long-Duration Crews

Just like a hiker preparing for a long trek, packing the foods that will give you the most energy for the longest amount of time is key to your success. This is also true for astronauts on long-duration missions. Our Energy investigation measures a crew members’ energy requirements, which is a crucial factor needed for sending the correct amount of the right types of food to space.

4. Exercise for Long-Term Missions

Rigorous exercise is already a regular part of astronauts’ routines, and continuing that focus will be critical to keeping crew members’ bodies strong and ready for a mission to Mars and a healthy return to Earth. Our Sprint investigation is studying the best combination of intensity and duration for exercise in space.

3. Determine Best Habitat/Environment for Crews

Have you ever complained about your room being too small? Imagine living in cramped quarters with an entire crew for months on a Mars mission! Our Habitability investigation collects observations that will help spacecraft designers understand how much habitable volume is required, and whether a mission’s duration impacts how much space crew members need.

2. Growing Food in Space

There’s nothing like fresh food. Not only does it provide valuable nutrition for astronauts, but can also offer psychological benefits from tending and harvesting the crops. Our Veggie investigation studies how to best utilize a facility aboard the space station for growing fresh produce in microgravity.

1. Manufacturing Items in Space

When crews head to Mars, there may be items that are unanticipated or that break during the mission. Our 3-D Printing in Zero-G Technology Demonstration would give crews the ability to manufacture new objects on demand while in space.

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