Payloads: BioFabrication Facility (BFF): Tissue Cassettes were installed into BFF. Using 3D biological printers to produce usable human organs has long been a dream of scientists and doctors around the globe. However, printing the tiny, complex structures found inside human organs, such as capillary structures, has proven difficult to accomplish in Earth’s gravity environment. To …
NASA Prepares for Historic Asteroid Sample Delivery on Sept. 24
After seven years in space, including a nail-biting touchdown on Bennu in 2020 to gather up dust and rocks, NASA's intrepid OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is about to face one of its biggest challenges yet: deliver an asteroid sample to Earth while protecting it from heat, vibrations, and earthly contaminants. "Once the sample capsule touches down, …
New Ocean Instrument — NASA’s GLIMR — Moves a Step Closer to Launch
NASA's GLIMR instrument — short for Geostationary Littoral Imaging and Monitoring Radiometer — is moving to its building phase. Originally selected in 2019, GLIMR recently underwent a review known as Key Decision Point C – which evaluated the instrument's preliminary design and project plan to deliver the instrument by January 2025. On March 21, GLIMR …
Welcome to the OSIRIS-REx Blog
Welcome to the OSIRIS-REx blog. Here you will find updates on NASA's first mission to collect an asteroid sample for analysis in labs around the globe. NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is cruising back to Earth now with samples it collected at the rocky surface of asteroid Bennu on Oct. 20, 2020. The spacecraft will deliver …
How Webb’s Coronagraphs Reveal Exoplanets in the Infrared
The study of exoplanets is a key part of the James Webb Space Telescope's science goals. We asked Webb's Deputy Observatory Project Scientist Christopher Stark of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center to tell us about one of the ways Webb studies other worlds. NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has many different observing modes to study …
Crew Talk Space With Students, Investigate Fire Control, and Continue Heart Health and Cargo Return Activities
Since the earliest days of the International Space Station expeditions, student groups in schools, camps, museums, and planetariums have had the opportunity to talk with astronauts aboard the orbital laboratory about career choices and science activities. On Thursday, NASA Flight Engineer Woody Hoburg conducted an ISS Ham Radio (ARISS) session with Lana’i High and Elementary School, in …
ISS Daily Summary Report – 3/23/2023
Payloads: Cardinal Heart 2.0: A preservative was injected into each Cardinal Heart 2.0 tissue chamber and microscopy imagery was conducted for specific chambers. A previous investigation showed that four weeks of microgravity exposure caused significant changes in heart cell function and gene expression that could lead to long-term damage or cardiac muscle atrophy. Effect of …
Team Troubleshoots Propulsion for NASA’s Lunar Flashlight
Teams are continuing work to place NASA’s Lunar Flashlight CubeSat in an orbit that would allow flights over the Moon’s South Pole. The opportunity to place Lunar Flashlight in such an orbit extends through the end of April. Shortly after launch on Dec. 11, 2022, the operations team for NASA’s Lunar Flashlight determined that three …
TEMPO Arrives Safely in Florida
The satellite host of NASA's Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution (TEMPO) instrument recently arrived by aircraft at NASA's Kennedy Space Center ahead of its launch from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in early April. From a geostationary, or fixed, orbit aboard the Maxar-built Intelsat 40e, TEMPO will be the first satellite instrument to make hourly …