Going For GOLD

What You Should Know About Scott Kelly’s #YearInSpace

1. It’s Actually More Like a Three-Year Mission

NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko may have had a year-long stay in space, but the science of their mission will span more than three years. One year before they left Earth, Kelly and Kornienko began participating in a suite of investigations aimed at better understanding how the human body responds to long-duration spaceflight. Samples of their blood, urine, saliva, and more all make up the data set scientists will study. The same kinds of samples continued to be taken throughout their stay in space, and will continue for a year or more once they return.

2. What We Learn is Helping Us Get to Mars

One of the biggest hurdles of getting to Mars is ensuring humans are “go” for a long-duration mission and that crew members will maintain their health and full capabilities for the duration of a Mars mission and after their return to Earth. Scientists have solid data about how bodies respond to living in microgravity for six months, but significant data beyond that timeframe had not been collected…until now. A mission to Mars will likely last about three years, about half the time coming and going to Mars and about half the time on Mars. We need to understand how human systems like vision and bone health are affected by the 12 to 16 months living on a spacecraft in microgravity and what countermeasures can be taken to reduce or mitigate risks to crew members during the flight to and from Mars. Understanding the challenges facing humans is just one of the ways research aboard the space station helps our journey to Mars.

3. The Science Will Take Some Time

While scientists will begin analyzing data from Kelly and Kornienko as soon as they return to Earth, it could be anywhere from six months to six years before we see published results from the research. The scientific process takes time, and processing the data from all the investigations tied to the one-year mission will be no easy task. Additionally, some blood, urine and saliva samples from Kelly and Kornienko will still be stored in the space station freezers until they can be returned on the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. Early on in the analytical process scientists may see indications of what we can expect, but final results will come long after Kelly and Kornienko land.

4. This Isn’t the First Time Someone Has Spent a Year in Space

This is the first time that extensive research using exciting new techniques like genetic studies has been conducted on very long-duration crew members. Astronaut Scott Kelly is the first American to complete a continuous, year-long mission in space and is now the American who has spent the most cumulative time in space, but it’s not the first time humans have reached this goal. Previously, only four humans have spent a year or more in orbit on a single mission, all aboard the Russian Mir Space Station. They all participated in significant research proving that humans are capable of living and working in space for a year or more.

Russian cosmonaut Valery Polyakov spent 438 days aboard Mir between January 1994 and March 1995 and holds the all-time record for the most continuous days spent in space.

Cosmonaut Sergei Avdeyev spent 380 days on Mir between August 1998 and August 1999.

Cosmonauts Vladimir Titov and Musa Manarov completed a 366-day mission from December 1987 to December 1988.

5. International Collaboration is Key

The International Space Station is just that: international. The one-year mission embodies the spirit of collaboration across countries in the effort to mitigate as many risks as possible for humans on long-duration missions. Data collected on both Kelly and Kornienko will be shared between the United States and Russia, and international partners. These kinds of collaborations help increase more rapidly the biomedical knowledge necessary for human exploration, reduce costs, improve processes and procedures, and improve efficiency on future space station missions.

6. So Much Science!

During Kelly’s year-long mission aboard the orbiting laboratory, his participation in science wasn’t limited to the one-year mission investigations. In all, he worked on close to 400 science studies that help us reach for new heights, reveal the unknown, and benefit all of humanity. His time aboard the station included blood draws, urine collection, saliva samples, computer tests, journaling, caring for two crops in the Veggie plant growth facility, ocular scans, ultrasounds, using the space cup, performing runs with the SPHERES robotic satellites, measuring sound, assisting in configuring cubesats to be deployed, measuring radiation, participating in fluid shifts testing in the Russian CHIBIS pants, logging his sleep and much, much more. All of this was in addition to regular duties of station maintenance, including three spacewalks!

7. No More Food in Pouches

After months of eating food from pouches and cans and drinking through straws, Kelly and Kornienko will be able to celebrate their return to Earth with food of their choice. While aboard the space station, their food intake is closely monitored and designed to provide exactly the nutrients they need. Crew members do have a say in their on-orbit menus but often miss their favorite meals from back home. Once they return, they won’t face the same menu limitations as they did in space. As soon as they land on Earth and exit the space capsule, they are usually given a piece of fruit or a cucumber to eat as they begin their initial health checks. After Kelly makes the long flight home to Houston, he will no doubt greatly savor those first meals.

8. After the Return Comes Reconditioning

You’ve likely heard the phrase, “Use it or lose it.” The same thing can be said for astronauts’ muscles and bones. Muscles and bones can atrophy in microgravity. While in space, astronauts have a hearty exercise regimen to fight these effects, and they continue strength training and reconditioning once they return to Earth. They will also participate in Field Tests immediately after landing. Once they are back at our Johnson Space Center, Functional Task Tests will assess how the human body responds to living in microgravity for such a long time. Understanding how astronauts recover after long-duration spaceflight is a critical piece in planning for missions to deep space.

9. Twins Studies Have Researchers Seeing Double

One of the unique aspects of Kelly’s participation in the one-year mission is that he has an identical twin brother, Mark, who is a former astronaut. The pair have taken part in a suite of studies that use Mark as a human control on the ground during Scott’s year-long stay in space. The Twins Study is comprised of 10 different investigations coordinating together and sharing all data and analysis as one large, integrated research team. The investigations focus on human physiology, behavioral health, microbiology/microbiome and molecular/omics. The Twins Study is multi-faceted national cooperation between investigations at universities, corporations, and government laboratories.

10. This Mission Will Help Determine What Comes Next

The completion of the one-year mission and its studies will help guide the next steps in planning for long-duration deep space missions that will be necessary as humans move farther into the solar system. Kelly and Kornienko’s mission will inform future decisions and planning for other long-duration missions, whether they are aboard the space station, a deep space habitat in lunar orbit, or a mission to Mars.

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10 Frequently Asked Questions About the James Webb Space Telescope

Got basic questions about the James Webb Space Telescope and what amazing things we’ll learn from it? We’ve got your answers right here! 

The James Webb Space Telescope, or Webb, is our upcoming infrared space observatory, which will launch in 2021. It will spy the first luminous objects that formed in the universe and shed light on how galaxies evolve, how stars and planetary systems are born, and how life could form on other planets.

1. What is the James Webb Space Telescope?

Our James Webb Space Telescope is a giant space telescope that observes infrared light. Rather than a replacement for the Hubble Space Telescope, it’s a scientific successor that will complement and extend its discoveries.

Being able to see longer wavelengths of light than Hubble and having greatly improved sensitivity will let Webb look further back in time to see the first galaxies that formed in the early universe, and to peer inside dust clouds where stars and planetary systems are forming today.

2. What are the most exciting things we will learn?

We have yet to observe the era of our universe’s history when galaxies began to form. 

We have a lot to learn about how galaxies got supermassive black holes in their centers, and we don't really know whether the black holes caused the galaxies to form or vice versa.

We can't see inside dust clouds with high resolution, where stars and planets are being born nearby, but Webb will be able to do just that. 

We don't know how many planetary systems might be hospitable to life, but Webb could tell whether some Earth-like planets have enough water to have oceans.

We don't know much about dark matter or dark energy, but we expect to learn more about where the dark matter is now, and we hope to learn the history of the acceleration of the universe that we attribute to dark energy. 

And then, there are the surprises we can't imagine!

3. Why is Webb an infrared telescope?

By viewing the universe at infrared wavelengths with such sensitivity, Webb will show us things never before seen by any other telescope. For example, it is only at infrared wavelengths that we can see the first stars and galaxies forming after the Big Bang. 

And it is with infrared light that we can see stars and planetary systems forming inside clouds of dust that are opaque to visible light, such as in the above visible and infrared light comparison image of the Carina Nebula.

4. Will Webb take amazing pictures like Hubble? Can Webb see visible light?

YES, Webb will take amazing pictures! We are going to be looking at things we've never seen before and looking at things we have seen before in completely new ways.

The beauty and quality of an astronomical image depends on two things: the sharpness and the number of pixels in the camera. On both of these counts, Webb is very similar to, and in many ways better than, Hubble. 

Additionally Webb can see orange and red visible light. Webb images will be different, but just as beautiful as Hubble's. Above, there is another comparison of infrared and visible light Hubble images, this time of the Monkey Head Nebula.

5. What will Webb's first targets be?

The first targets for Webb will be determined through a process similar to that used for the Hubble Space Telescope and will involve our experts, the European Space Agency (ESA), the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), and scientific community participants.

The first engineering target will come before the first science target and will be used to align the mirror segments and focus the telescope. That will probably be a relatively bright star or possibly a star field.

6. How does Webb compare with Hubble?

Webb is designed to look deeper into space to see the earliest stars and galaxies that formed in the universe and to look deep into nearby dust clouds to study the formation of stars and planets.

In order to do this, Webb has a much larger primary mirror than Hubble (2.5 times larger in diameter, or about 6 times larger in area), giving it more light-gathering power. It also will have infrared instruments with longer wavelength coverage and greatly improved sensitivity than Hubble. 

Finally, Webb will operate much farther from Earth, maintaining its extremely cold operating temperature, stable pointing and higher observing efficiency than with the Earth-orbiting Hubble.

7. What will Webb tell us about planets outside our solar system? Will it take photos of these planets?

Webb will be able to tell us the composition of the atmospheres of planets outside our solar system, aka exoplanets. It will observe planetary atmospheres through the transit technique. A transit is when a planet moves across the disc of its parent star. 

Webb will also carry coronographs to enable photography of exoplanets (planets outside our solar system) near bright stars (if they are big and bright and far from the star), but they will be only "dots," not grand panoramas. Coronographs block the bright light of stars, which could hide nearby objects like exoplanets.

Consider how far away exoplanets are from us, and how small they are by comparison to this distance! We didn’t even know what Pluto really looked like until we were able to send an observatory to fly right near it in 2015, and Pluto is in our own solar system!

8. Will we image objects in our own solar system?

Yes! Webb will be able to observe the planets at or beyond the orbit of Mars, satellites, comets, asteroids and objects in the distant, icy Kuiper Belt.

Many important molecules, ices and minerals have strong characteristic signatures at the wavelengths Webb can observe. 

Webb will also monitor the weather of planets and their moons. 

Because the telescope and instruments have to be kept cold, Webb’s protective sunshield will block the inner solar system from view. This means that the Sun, Earth, Moon, Mercury, and Venus, and of course Sun-grazing comets and many known near-Earth objects cannot be observed.

9. How far back will Webb see? 

Webb will be able to see what the universe looked like around a quarter of a billion years (possibly back to 100 million years) after the Big Bang, when the first stars and galaxies started to form.

10. When will Webb launch and how long is the mission?

Webb will launch in 2021 from French Guiana on a European Space Agency Ariane 5 rocket. 

Webb’s mission lifetime after launch is designed to be at least 5-1/2 years, and could last longer than 10 years. The lifetime is limited by the amount of fuel used for maintaining the orbit, and by the possibility that Webb’s components will degrade over time in the harsh environment of space.

Looking for some more in-depth FAQs? You can find them HERE.

Learn more about the James Webb Space Telescope HERE, or follow the mission on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

IMAGE CREDITS Carina Nebula: ESO/T. Preibisch Monkey Head Nebula: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA), and J. Hester

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A cluster of newborn stars herald their birth in this interstellar picture obtained with our Spitzer Space Telescope. These bright young stars are found in a rosebud-shaped (and rose-colored) nebulosity. The star cluster and its associated nebula are located at a distance of 3300 light-years in the constellation Cepheus.

A recent census of the cluster reveals the presence of 130 young stars. The stars formed from a massive cloud of gas and dust that contains enough raw materials to create a thousand Sun-like stars. In a process that astronomers still poorly understand, fragments of this molecular cloud became so cold and dense that they collapsed into stars. Most stars in our Milky Way galaxy are thought to form in such clusters.

The Spitzer Space Telescope image was obtained with an infrared array camera that is sensitive to invisible infrared light at wavelengths that are about ten times longer than visible light. In this four-color composite, emission at 3.6 microns is depicted in blue, 4.5 microns in green, 5.8 microns in orange, and 8.0 microns in red. The image covers a region that is about one quarter the size of the full moon.

As in any nursery, mayhem reigns. Within the astronomically brief period of a million years, the stars have managed to blow a large, irregular bubble in the molecular cloud that once enveloped them like a cocoon. The rosy pink hue is produced by glowing dust grains on the surface of the bubble being heated by the intense light from the embedded young stars. Upon absorbing ultraviolet and visible-light photons produced by the stars, the surrounding dust grains are heated and re-emit the energy at the longer infrared wavelengths observed by Spitzer. The reddish colors trace the distribution of molecular material thought to be rich in hydrocarbons.

The cold molecular cloud outside the bubble is mostly invisible in these images. However, three very young stars near the center of the image are sending jets of supersonic gas into the cloud. The impact of these jets heats molecules of carbon monoxide in the cloud, producing the intricate green nebulosity that forms the stem of the rosebud.

Not all stars are formed in clusters. Away from the main nebula and its young cluster are two smaller nebulae, to the left and bottom of the central 'rosebud,'each containing a stellar nursery with only a few young stars.

Astronomers believe that our own Sun may have formed billions of years ago in a cluster similar to this one. Once the radiation from new cluster stars destroys the surrounding placental material, the stars begin to slowly drift apart.

Additional information about the Spitzer Space Telescope is available at http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu.

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A patchwork of bright, criss-crossing cloud trails was created by ships churning through the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Portugal and Spain in this image captured by one of our Earth observing satellites. The narrow clouds known as ship tracks, form when water vapor condenses around tiny particles of pollution that ships emit.

Some of the pollution particles generated by ships (especially sulfates) are soluble in water and serve as the seeds around which cloud droplets form. Clouds infused with ship exhaust have more and smaller droplets than unpolluted clouds. Because of this, the light hitting the polluted clouds scatters in many directions, making them appear brighter and thicker than unpolluted marine clouds, which are typically seeded by larger, naturally occurring particles such as sea salt.

Learn more about this image HERE. 

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Why does it take so long for the rover to reach Mars?

Extreme Science: Launching Sounding Rockets from The Arctic

This winter, our scientists and engineers traveled to the world's northernmost civilian town to launch rockets equipped with cutting-edge scientific instruments.

This is the beginning of a 14-month-long campaign to study a particular region of Earth's magnetic field — which means launching near the poles. What's it like to launch a science rocket in these extreme conditions?

Our planet is protected by a natural magnetic field that deflects most of the particles that flow out from the Sun — the solar wind — away from our atmosphere. But near the north and south poles, two oddities in Earth's magnetic field funnel these solar particles directly into our atmosphere. These regions are the polar cusps, and it turns out they're the ideal spot for studying how our atmosphere interacts with space.

The scientists of the Grand Challenge Initiative — Cusp are using sounding rockets to do their research. Sounding rockets are suborbital rockets that launch to a few hundred miles in altitude, spending a few minutes in space before falling back to Earth. That means sounding rockets can carry sensitive instruments above our atmosphere to study the Sun, other stars and even distant galaxies.

They also fly directly through some of the most interesting regions of Earth's atmosphere, and that's what scientists are taking advantage of for their Grand Challenge experiments.

One of the ideal rocket ranges for cusp science is in Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard, off the coast of Norway and within the Arctic circle. Because of its far northward position, each morning Svalbard passes directly under Earth's magnetic cusp.

But launching in this extreme, remote environment puts another set of challenges on the mission teams. These launches need to happen during the winter, when Svalbard experiences 24/7 darkness because of Earth's axial tilt. The launch teams can go months without seeing the Sun.

Like for all rocket launches, the science teams have to wait for the right weather conditions to launch. Because they're studying upper atmospheric processes, some of these teams also have to wait for other science conditions, like active auroras. Auroras are created when charged particles collide with Earth’s atmosphere — often triggered by solar storms or changes in the solar wind — and they're related to many of the upper-atmospheric processes that scientists want to study near the magnetic cusp.

But even before launch, the extreme conditions make launching rockets a tricky business — it's so cold that the rockets must be encased in styrofoam before launch to protect them from the low temperatures and potential precipitation.

When all is finally ready, an alarm sounds throughout the town of Ny-Ålesund to alert residents to the impending launch. And then it's up, up and away! This photo shows the launch of the twin VISIONS-2 sounding rockets on Dec. 7, 2018 from Ny-Ålesund.

These rockets are designed to break up during flight — so after launch comes clean-up. The launch teams track where debris lands so that they can retrieve the pieces later.

The next launch of the Grand Challenge Initiative is AZURE, launching from Andøya Space Center in Norway in March 2019.

 For even more about what it's like to launch science rockets in extreme conditions, check out one scientist's notes from the field: https://go.nasa.gov/2QzyjR4

For updates on the Grand Challenge Initiative and other sounding rocket flights, visit nasa.gov/soundingrockets or follow along with NASA Wallops and NASA heliophysics on Twitter and Facebook.

@NASA_Wallops | NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility | @NASASun | NASA Sun Science

Solar System 10 Things: Spitzer Space Telescope

Our Spitzer Space Telescope is celebrating 15 years since its launch on August 25, 2003. This remarkable spacecraft has made discoveries its designers never even imagined, including some of the seven Earth-size planets of TRAPPIST-1. Here are some key facts about Spitzer:

1. Spitzer is one of our Great Observatories.

Our Great Observatory Program aimed to explore the universe with four large space telescopes, each specialized in viewing the universe in different wavelengths of light. The other Great Observatories are our Hubble Space Telescope, Chandra X-Ray Observatory, and Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory. By combining data from different kinds of telescopes, scientists can paint a fuller picture of our universe.

2. Spitzer operates in infrared light.

Infrared wavelengths of light, which primarily come from heat radiation, are too long to be seen with human eyes, but are important for exploring space — especially when it comes to getting information about something extremely far away. From turbulent clouds where stars are born to small asteroids close to Earth’s orbit, a wide range of phenomena can be studied in infrared light. Objects too faint or distant for optical telescopes to detect, hidden by dense clouds of space dust, can often be seen with Spitzer. In this way, Spitzer acts as an extension of human vision to explore the universe, near and far.

What’s more, Spitzer doesn’t have to contend with Earth’s atmosphere, daily temperature variations or day-night cycles, unlike ground-based telescopes. With a mirror less than 1 meter in diameter, Spitzer in space is more sensitive than even a 10-meter-diameter telescope on Earth.

3. Spitzer was the first spacecraft to fly in an Earth-trailing orbit.

Rather than circling Earth, as Hubble does, Spitzer orbits the Sun on almost the same path as Earth. But Spitzer moves slower than Earth, so the spacecraft drifts farther away from our planet each year.

This “Earth-trailing orbit” has many advantages. Being farther from Earth than a satellite, it receives less heat from our planet and enjoys a naturally cooler environment. Spitzer also benefits from a wider view of the sky by orbiting the Sun. While its field of view changes throughout the year, at any given time it can see about one-third of the sky. Our Kepler space telescope, famous for finding thousands of exoplanets – planets outside our solar system -- also settled in an Earth-trailing orbit six years after Spitzer.

4. Spitzer began in a “cold mission.”

Spitzer has far outlived its initial requirement of 2.5 years. The Spitzer team calls the first 5.5 years “the cold mission” because the spacecraft’s instruments were deliberately cooled down during that time. Liquid helium coolant kept Spitzer’s instruments just a few degrees above absolute zero (which is minus 459 degrees Fahrenheit, or minus 273 degrees Celsius) in this first part of the mission.

5. The “warm mission” was still pretty cold.

Spitzer entered what was called the “warm mission” when the 360 liters of liquid helium coolant that was chilling its instruments ran out in May 2009.

At the “warm” temperature of minus 405 Fahrenheit, two of Spitzer's instruments -- the Infrared Spectrograph (IRS) and Multiband Imaging Photometer (MIPS) -- stopped working. But two of the four detector arrays in the Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) persisted. These “channels” of the camera have driven Spitzer’s explorations since then.

6. Spitzer wasn’t designed to study exoplanets, but made huge strides in this area.

Exoplanet science was in its infancy in 2003 when Spitzer launched, so the mission’s first scientists and engineers had no idea it could observe planets beyond our solar system. But the telescope’s accurate star-targeting system and the ability to control unwanted changes in temperature have made it a useful tool for studying exoplanets. During the Spitzer mission, engineers have learned how to control the spacecraft’s pointing more precisely to find and characterize exoplanets, too.

Using what’s called the “transit method,” Spitzer can stare at a star and detect periodic dips in brightness that happen when a planet crosses a star’s face. In one of its most remarkable achievements, Spitzer discovered three of the TRAPPIST-1 planets and confirmed that the system has seven Earth-sized planets orbiting an ultra-cool dwarf star. Spitzer data also helped scientists determine that all seven planets are rocky, and made these the best-understood exoplanets to date.

Spitzer can also use a technique called microlensing to find planets closer to the center of our galaxy. When a star passes in front of another star, the gravity of the first star can act as a lens, making the light from the more distant star appear brighter. Scientists are using microlensing to look for a blip in that brightening, which could mean that the foreground star has a planet orbiting it. Microlensing could not have been done early in the mission when Spitzer was closer to Earth, but now that the spacecraft is farther away, it has a better chance of measuring these events.

7. Spitzer is a window into the distant past.

The spacecraft has observed and helped discover some of the most distant objects in the universe, helping scientists understand where we came from. Originally, Spitzer’s camera designers had hoped the spacecraft would detect galaxies about 12 billion light-years away. In fact, Spitzer has surpassed that, and can see even farther back in time – almost to the beginning of the universe. In collaboration with Hubble, Spitzer helped characterize the galaxy GN-z11 about 13.4 billion light-years away, whose light has been traveling since 400 million years after the big bang. It is the farthest galaxy known.

8. Spitzer discovered Saturn’s largest ring.

Everyone knows Saturn has distinctive rings, but did you know its largest ring was only discovered in 2009, thanks to Spitzer? Because this outer ring doesn’t reflect much visible light, Earth-based telescopes would have a hard time seeing it. But Spitzer saw the infrared glow from the cool dust in the ring. It begins 3.7 million miles (6 million kilometers) from Saturn and extends about 7.4 million miles (12 million kilometers) beyond that.

9. The “Beyond Phase” pushes Spitzer to new limits.

In 2016, Spitzer entered its “Beyond phase,” with a name reflecting how the spacecraft operates beyond its original scope.

As Spitzer floats away from Earth, its increasing distance presents communication challenges. Engineers must point Spitzer’s antenna at higher angles toward the Sun in order to talk to our planet, which exposes the spacecraft to more heat. At the same time, the spacecraft’s solar panels receive less sunlight because they point away from the Sun, putting more stress on the battery.

The team decided to override some autonomous safety systems so Spitzer could continue to operate in this riskier mode. But so far, the Beyond phase is going smoothly.

10. Spitzer paves the way for future infrared telescopes.

Spitzer has identified areas of further study for our upcoming James Webb Space Telescope, planned to launch in 2021. Webb will also explore the universe in infrared light, picking up where Spitzer eventually will leave off. With its enhanced ability to probe planetary atmospheres, Webb may reveal striking new details about exoplanets that Spitzer found. Distant galaxies unveiled by Spitzer together with other telescopes will also be observed in further detail by Webb. The space telescope we are planning after that, WFIRST, will also investigate long-standing mysteries by looking at infrared light. Scientists planning studies with future infrared telescopes will naturally build upon the pioneering legacy of Spitzer.

Read the web version of this week’s “Solar System: 10 Things to Know” article HERE. 

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We Just Identified More Than 200 New (Potential) Planets

The Kepler space telescope is our first mission capable of identifying Earth-size planets around other stars. On Monday, June 19, 2017, scientists from many countries gathered at our Ames Research Center to talk about the latest results from the spacecraft, which include the identification of more than 200 potential new worlds! Here’s what you need to know:

We found 219 new planet candidates.

All of these worlds were found in a patch of sky near the Cygnus constellation in our Milky Way galaxy. Between 2009 and 2013, Kepler searched more than 200,000 stars in the region for orbiting planets. The 219 new planet candidates are part of the more than 4,000 planet candidates and 2,300 confirmed planets Kepler has identified to date.

Ten of these worlds are like our own.

Out of the 219 new planet candidates, 10 are possibly rocky, terrestrial worlds and orbit their star in the habitable zone – the range of distances from a star where liquid water could pool on the surface of a rocky planet.

Small planets come in two sizes.

Kepler has opened up our eyes to the existence of many small worlds. It turns out a lot of these planets are either approximately 1.5 times the size of Earth or just smaller than Neptune. The cool names given to planets of these sizes? Super Earths and mini-Neptunes.

Some of the new planets could be habitable. 

Water is a key ingredient to life as we know it. Many of the new planet candidates are likely to have small rocky cores enveloped by a thick atmosphere of hydrogen and helium, and some are thought to be ocean worlds. That doesn’t necessarily mean the oceans of these planets are full of water, but we can dream, can’t we?

Other Earths are out there.

Kepler’s survey has made it possible for us to measure the number of Earth-size habitable zone planets in our galaxy. Determining how many planets like our own that exist is the big question we’ll explore next.

The hunt for new planets continues.

Kepler continues to search for planets in different regions of space. With the launch of our Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) in 2018, we’re going to search for planets nearest the sun and measure the composition of their atmospheres. In the mid-2020s, we have our sights on taking a picture of small planets like Earth with our Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST).

*All images of planets are artist illustrations.

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NASA Astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley undock from the International Space Station at 7:34 p.m. EDT tonight, bringing to a close their ~2 month Launch America mission. Check out these science highlights from the 100+ hours of work they completed aboard the orbital lab. 

Watch live coverage of undocking and splashdown here: https://www.nasa.gov/nasalive

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Friday Stroll? How About a Spacewalk?

On Friday, May 12, NASA astronauts Peggy Whitson and Jack Fischer will venture outside the International Space Station, into the vacuum of space, for a spacewalk.

Space Fact: This will be the 200th spacewalk performed on the space station!

You can watch their entire 6.5 hour spacewalk live online! (Viewing info below!) To tell the two astronauts apart in their bulky spacewalk suits, Whitson will be wearing the suit with red stripes, while Jack Fischer will have white stripes.

Space Fact: The first-ever spacewalk on the International Space Station was performed on Dec. 7, 1998.

For Peggy, this will be her ninth spacewalk! She actually holds the record for most spacewalks by a female astronaut. For Fischer, this is his first time in space, and will be his first spacewalk. You can see from the below Tweet, he’s pretty excited!

Once both astronauts venture outside the Quest airlock, their tasks will focus on:

Replacing a large avionic box that supplies electricity and data connections to the science experiments

Replacing hardware stored outside the station

Specifically, the ExPRESS Carrier Avionics, or ExPCA will be replaced with a unit delivered to the station last month aboard the Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo spacecraft.

Ever wonder how astronauts prepare and practice for these activities? Think about it, wearing a bulky spacesuit (with gloves!), floating in the vacuum of space, PLUS you have to perform complex tasks for a period of ~6.5 hours! 

In order to train on Earth, astronauts complete tasks in our Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory (NBL). It’s a gigantic pool with a full mock up of the International Space Station! Here’s a clip of astronauts practicing to install the ExPCA in that practice pool at Johnson Space Center in Houston. 

In addition, Whitson and Fischer will install a connector that will route data to the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer and help the crew determine the most efficient way to conduct future maintenance on the cosmic ray detector.

The astronauts will also install a protective shield on the Pressurized Mating Adapter-3, which was moved in March. This adapter will host a new international docking port for the arrival of commercial crew spacecraft.

Finally, the duo will rig a new high-definition camera and pair of wireless antennas to the exterior of the outpost.

Watch the Spacewalk Live!

Live coverage will begin at 6:30 a.m. EDT, with spacewalk activities starting at 8 a.m. EDT. 

Stream the entire spacewalk live online at nasa.gov/live 

OR 

Watch live on the International Space Station Facebook page starting at 7:00 a.m. EDT

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