NASA Science

NASA Science seeks to discover the secrets of the universe, search for life elsewhere, and protect and improve life on Earth and in space.

april 8, 2024

2024 Total Solar Eclipse

Monitor earth and Space weatheR

GOES-U Launch

VIPER robotic moon rover

Fly your name to the Moon
An artist’s concept of a landscape framed inside a sphere, which doubles as an eclipse. The concept is composed of dusky purples, oranges, golds, and greens. In the left foreground, a young woman wearing a white dress basks in the rays of a solar eclipse. She stands under a bright orange fall tree rooted to the side of a rocky mountain trail. The scene overlooks a valley with a river running through the middle towards distant hazy blue mountains. Nocturnal animals – including a fox, owl, possum, and bat – emerge to investigate the sudden onset of night. A deer stands on a grassy knoll at right in front of a line of fall colored trees. The Milky Way trails across the sky, leading up from the young woman to the eclipse and glittering stars at top right. Two hot air balloons float in the distance. This concept was created in celebration of the Heliophysics Big Year, which is bookended by the Annular Eclipse in October of 2023 and the Total Solar Eclipse in April of 2024. It also serves as the cover of the 2024 NASA Science Planning Guide.

Welcome to our NASA Science website

A gateway to our missions, research, and engagement efforts.

The Science Mission Directorate inspires the learners of today and develops the leaders of tomorrow. One of our key strategies is to purposefully and actively engage with audiences and learners of all ages to share the story of NASA’s integrated science program. From exoplanet research to better understanding Earth’s climate to understanding the influence of the sun on our planet and the solar system, our work is interdisciplinary and collaborative. Similarly, this website showcases our work in a crosscutting way so that we may build stronger connections with you, our most important stakeholder. Together, we lead a globally interconnected program of scientific discovery that encourages innovation, positively impacts people’s lives, and is a source of inspiration.

Read Nicky Notes
Dr. Nicola Fox speaking at a recent event in Washington, D.C.
Science Mission Directorate Associate Administrator, Dr. Nicola Fox, speaking at a recent event in Washington, D.C. about the success of the Parker Solar Probe mission.
NASA/Aubrey Gemignani
Featured Story

Solar Eclipse Resources

A spectacular eclipse will sweep across North America on April 8, 2024! Enjoy these free resources from the Astronomical Society…

Read the Story
Alma Thomas, The Eclipse, 1970, Smithsonian American Art Museum

Featured Missions

Our mission milestones showcase the breadth and depth of NASA science.

All NASA Science Missions
Artist concept of the GOES-U satellite in orbit around the earth

GOES-U

Launching no earlier than May 2024, GOES-U will provide advanced detection and monitoring of environmental phenomena that directly affect public safety, protection of property, and the nation’s economic health.

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artist's concept of Europa Clipper

Europa Clipper

Launching in October 2024, Europa Clipper’s main science goal is to determine whether there are places below the surface of Jupiter’s icy moon, Europa, that could support life.

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Illustration of NASA's Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) on the surface of the Moon

VIPER

VIPER launches late 2024 and will be NASA's first robotic Moon rover to measure the location and concentration of water ice and other resources. These resources could eventually be harvested to sustain human exploration on the Moon, Mars — and beyond!

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Latest News

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Article
5 min read

Scientists Pursue the Total Solar Eclipse with NASA Jet Planes

Article
6 min read

NASA’s Webb Probes an Extreme Starburst Galaxy

Left: Messier 82 as imaged by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Hour-glass-shaped red plumes of gas are shooting outward from above and below a bright blue, disk-shaped center of a galaxy. This galaxy is surrounded by many white stars and set against the black background of space. A small square highlights the section that the image on the right shows in greater detail. White text at bottom reads "Hubble." Right: A section of Messier 82 as imaged by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. An edge-on spiral starburst galaxy with a bright white, glowing core set against the black background of space. A white band of the edge-on disk extends from lower left to upper right. Dark brown tendrils of dust are scattered thinly along this band. Many white points in various sizes – stars or star clusters – are scattered throughout the image, but are most heavily concentrated toward the center. Many clumpy, red filaments extend vertically above and below the galaxy’s plane. White text at bottom reads "Webb."
Artist's concept shows the red-dwarf star, TRAPPIST-1, at the upper left, with two large dots on the face of the disk representing transiting planets; five more planets are shown at varying positions descending toward the lower right as they orbit the star. Artist's concept shows the TRAPPIST-1 planets as they might be seen from Earth using an extremely powerful – and fictional – telescope. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
5 min read

That Starry Night Sky? It’s Full of Eclipses

Article2 days ago
A model showing the evolution of the solar corona prediction for April 8, 2024. It shows the solar corona as white light with defined structure encircling a black disk. The structured light ripples and changes throughout the animation, which represents coronal predictions.
4 min read

Scientists Use NASA Data to Predict Solar Corona Before Eclipse

Article2 days ago
The class of 2024 NHFP Fellows are shown in this photo montage (top to bottom, left to right): The Hubble Fellows (seen in the red hexagons) are: Michael Calzadilla, Sanskriti Das, Yue Hu, Wynn Jacobson-Galan, Madeleine McKenzie, Jed McKinney, Andrew Saydjari, Peter Senchyna, Raphael Skalidis and Adam Smercina. The Einstein Fellows (seen in the blue hexagons) are: Vishal Baibhav, Jordy Davelaar, Alexander Dittmann, Cristhian Garcia Quintero, Amelia (Lia) Hankla and Keefe Mitman. The Sagan Fellows (seen in green hexagons) are: Jaren Ashcraft, Kiersten Boley, Cheng Han Hsieh, Rafael Luque, Sarah Moran, Shangjia Zhang, Lily Zhao and Sebastian Zieba.
5 min read

NASA Awards Astrophysics Postdoctoral Fellowships for 2024

Article2 days ago
Featured Video

What’s Up: April 2024 Skywatching Tips from NASA

What are some skywatching highlights in April 2024? Catch Mars and Saturn rising, and Jupiter hangs out with Comet 12P. Plus NASA has you covered for the total eclipse whether you're headed to totality or watching from afar.

Watch Now
SCience

By the Numbers

Science is interconnected; no important question stands alone. The Science Mission Directorate (SMD) is an organization where discoveries in one scientific discipline have a direct route to other areas of study. This flow is something extremely valuable and is rare in the scientific world.

Learn More about NASA Science
A complex info graphic with text, numbers, icons on a dark blue background laid out in a circular design
Featured Story

NASA’s Webb Probes an Extreme Starburst Galaxy

Amid a site teeming with new and young stars lies an intricate substructure. A team of astronomers has used NASA’s…

Read the Story
Left: Messier 82 as imaged by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Hour-glass-shaped red plumes of gas are shooting outward from above and below a bright blue, disk-shaped center of a galaxy. This galaxy is surrounded by many white stars and set against the black background of space. A small square highlights the section that the image on the right shows in greater detail. White text at bottom reads "Hubble." Right: A section of Messier 82 as imaged by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. An edge-on spiral starburst galaxy with a bright white, glowing core set against the black background of space. A white band of the edge-on disk extends from lower left to upper right. Dark brown tendrils of dust are scattered thinly along this band. Many white points in various sizes – stars or star clusters – are scattered throughout the image, but are most heavily concentrated toward the center. Many clumpy, red filaments extend vertically above and below the galaxy’s plane. White text at bottom reads "Webb."
earth information center

Explore our changing planet

Discover Earth as NASA sees it. Learn why this information matters to us all.

Visit the Earth Information Center
An image of the earth overlayed in colorful bands of satellite data
Credit: NASA Science Visualization

The Sun and Heliophysics

NASA studies the star at the center of our solar system and its influence on space, Earth, and our solar system. This research helps us to not only understand how the universe works, but also protect our technology and astronauts in space.

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2c.SolarScience_image.jpg

What's out there?

An aqua-colorized satellite image of the sun with solar flares

Solar Science

Exploring the Sun's structure, behavior, and the effects of its radiant energy on the solar system and Earth.

Magnetospheres

Learning how protective magnetic fields surrounding planets shield them from solar wind and cosmic radiation.

A

Ionosphere, Thermosphere, and Mesosphere

Studying the regions where Earth's atmosphere transitions into the ionized plasma of space.

Heliosphere

Understanding how the invisible bubble surrounding our solar system is protecting life here on Earth.

An X 1.4 solar flare erupted on the right side of the sun on the evening of April. 24, 2014. This composite image, captured at 8:42 p.m. EST, shows the sun in ultraviolet light with wavelength of both 131 and 304 angstroms. Cropped.

Space Weather

Researching how environmental conditions in space can impact satellites, communications, and power grids on Earth.

A total solar eclipse is seen on Monday, August 21, 2017 above Madras, Oregon. A total solar eclipse swept across a narrow portion of the contiguous United States from Lincoln Beach, Oregon to Charleston, South Carolina. A partial solar eclipse was visible across the entire North American continent along with parts of South America, Africa, and Europe. Photo Credit: (NASA/Aubrey Gemignani)

Heliophysics Big Year

Celebrating solar science and the Sun's influence on Earth and the solar system.

Dive Deeper

SMD Community Town Hall Meetings

View upcoming and past community town hall meetings.

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NASA Science Strategy

Our science strategy articulates a forward-thinking vision and presents a comprehensive, cohesive and long-term roadmap for all NASA activities.

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People of NASA Science

Meet the individuals who are instrumental in enabling the realization of NASA Science’s extraordinary mission.

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NASA Science Careers

Discover career opportunities at NASA Science, where innovation, growth and collaboration shape the future of scientific exploration.

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Keep Exploring

More about NASA Science

Science Missions

Hubble floating above Earth

Science News

Red dual opposing jets coming from young stars fill the darker top half of the image, while a glowing pale-yellow, cave-like structure is bottom center, tilted toward two o’clock, with a bright star at its center. See extended description for more.

Science for Everyone

A person looks through a telescope. There is a large solar filter blocking the front of the telescope.

For Researchers