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Live From the Clean Room at JPL

Watch Us Build Two New Missions

Welcome to the High Bay 1 clean room in the Spacecraft Assembly Facility at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. Many of NASA's most famous robotic spacecraft were assembled and tested in High Bay 1, including most of the Ranger and Mariner spacecraft; Voyager 1; the Galileo and Cassini orbiters; and all of NASA's Mars rovers. Currently, we have a special treat; two missions are sharing the room — NEO Surveyor and ASTHROS. Here is what you're seeing on the live cam:

Hello, Roomies!

  • On the Right: ASTHROS

    ASTHROS (Astrophysics Stratospheric Telescope for High Spectral Resolution Observations at Submillimeter-wavelengths) is a high-altitude astrophysics balloon mission. It will be able to detect wavelengths of light blocked by Earth’s atmosphere, and observe cosmic phenomena not visible from the ground. On the Live Cam, you can see its lightweight 8.2-foot (2.5-meter) gold-coated primary mirror — one of the largest ever to fly on a high-altitude balloon. Carried beneath a balloon the size of a football stadium, ASTHROS will rise to an altitude of 130,000 feet (about 40 kilometers) above Antarctica. For up to one month, it will ride a polar vortex around the center of the continent.

    Learn About ASTHROS

    El espejo primario de 2,5 metros (8,2 pies) de di�metro de la misi�n ASTHROS, que se muestra aqu�, es uno de los m�s grandes que jam�s haya volado en un globo de gran altitud. Este espejo de peso ligero est� recubierto de oro y n�quel para que sea m�s reflectante en las longitudes de onda del infrarrojo lejano. Cr�ditos: Media Lario
    The ASTHROS mission's primary mirror, shown here, is one of the largest ever flown on a high-altitude balloon. This lightweight mirror is coated with gold and nickel to make it more reflective in far-infrared wavelengths.
    Credit: Media Lario

  • On the Left: NEO Surveyor

    Near-Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor is the first space telescope specifically designed to hunt asteroids and comets that may be potential hazards to Earth. You can see the NEO Surveyor instrument enclosure on the left side of the room. It's a large, triangular-shaped black box. The enclosure is a key part of the spacecraft, it will house NEO Surveyor’s powerful infrared telescope. When completed and tested, the enclosure will be mounted to the back of the spacecraft’s large sunshield and avionics for the mission. NEO Surveyor is scheduled to launch no earlier than September 2027.

    Learn About NEO Surveyor

    A large, black triangular-shaped object sits on a white platform with workers in white protective clothing nearby. An orange lift is to the right and lots of other equipment is in the background.
    The instrument enclosure for NEO Surveyor is prepared for environmental testing at Johnson Space Center in Houston in December 2024.
    NASA/JPL-Caltech

Learn More

A silver, wedge-shaped spacecraft with a black telescope on the front, hovers against the darkness of space.

More About NEO Surveyor

Artist’s concept of the ASTHROS telescope suspended beneath a massive stratospheric balloon, floating high above Earth’s atmosphere. The translucent, textured balloon dominates the image, with the telescope payload hanging below it on a thin cable. The curvature of Earth is visible at the bottom, transitioning into a dark, star-filled sky, illustrating the telescope’s operation above atmospheric interference.

More About ASTHROS

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