NASA Science Missions

Featured Missions

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

All Science Missions
Artist Rendering of NISAR

NISAR

Launching in September 2024, NISAR will systematically map Earth and study changes to ice sheets, glaciers, and sea ice in fine detail, as climate change warms the air and ocean.

More about NISAR
A spacecraft hovers over a reddish striped moon with planet Jupiter in the background.

Europa Clipper

Europa Clipper is launching Oct. 10, 2024 with the main science goal of determining whether there are places below the surface of Jupiter’s icy moon, Europa, that could support life.

More about Europa Clipper
Artist's concept of the Lucy orbiter with its distinctive round solar panels as it flies past a Trojan asteroid near Jupiter.

Lucy

Launched in October 2021, Lucy will explore a record-breaking number of asteroids, flying by three asteroids in the solar system’s main asteroid belt, and by eight Trojan asteroids that share an orbit around the Sun with Jupiter.

More about Lucy
Featured Video

From GOES to GeoXO: Past Highlights to Future Horizons

When NOAA’s GOES-U satellite is launched it will be the final satellite in a heralded NOAA satellite program and bridge to another future age of advanced satellite technology. For nearly 50 years, NOAA and NASA have partnered to develop and advance NOAA’s geostationary satellites as part of the most sophisticated weather-observing, environmental monitoring, and space weather monitoring satellite system in the world.

Learn More about the GOES Mission

NASA Science Fleet Chart

NASA Science missions circle the Earth, the Sun, the Moon, Mars, and many other destinations within our Solar System, including spacecraft that look out even further into our universe. The Science Fleet depicts the scope of NASA’s activity and how our missions have permeated throughout the solar system.

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An infographic displaying all of the NASA Science mission fleet spacecraft in their approximate location in our universe.
Updated October 2023
All Science Missions

ACE

active Mission

NASA’s Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE) collects and analyzes particles of solar, interplanetary, interstellar and galactic origins. The data contributes to our understanding of the Sun, its interaction with Earth, and…

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An artist's rendering of NASA's ACE spacecraft.

All Science Missions

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Cosmos With a Stratospheric Balloon

ASTHROS

a diagram of the ARIEL satellite

Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey

the BECCAL mission logo

BECCAL

an illustration of GLIDE

Carruthers Geocorona Observatory

an illustration of chandrayaan-3 on the moon

Chandrayaan-3

Lunar Lander / Rover (India)

CLARREO

COSI

Round probe descending to Venus with hazy yellowish sky and mountains in background

DAVINCI

Artist’s concept of Dragonfly soaring over the dunes of Saturn’s moon Titan.

Dragonfly

Illustration showing EnVision in front of alternate versions of Venus. One version is warm and wet. The other is the rugged wasteland we know today.

EnVision

An animation showing Mars against a black background. Two spacecraft – like short gray cyclinders with flat panels on the right and left – orbit the planet.

ESCAPADE

ESCAPADE is the first multi-spacecraft orbital science mission to the Red Planet. Its twin orbiters will take simultaneous observations from…

Workers in blue protective clothing and white head coverings hold cables to position Europa Clipper's high gain antenna for installation on the spacecraft. Some workers are on the ground, and some are up on a platform.

Europa Clipper

Europa Clipper will search for signs of potential habitability on Jupiter's icy ocean moon Europa.

Illustration of a spacecraft with a yellow and green image of the sun in the background; the text reads EUVST: extreme ultraviolet high-throughput spectroscopic telescope

EUVST

Extreme Ultraviolet High-Throughput Spectroscopic Telescope Epsilon Mission (EUVST) will expand how NASA studies the Sun, space, and Earth as an…

Rover on Mars.

ExoMars Rover

Goals The ExoMars rover will search for signs of life on Mars. A Russian science platform will land with it.…

Artist concept of spacecraft scanning the green surface of the sun; text reads EZIE: Electrojet Zeeman Imaging Explorer

EZIE

The Electrojet Zeeman Imaging Explorer, EZIE, is a heliophysics mission recently approved to explore the Sun and the system that…

GDC mission

GDC

GLIMR

A white airplane sits on the snow at McMurdo Station, Antarctica. Workers, some wearing orange vests, stand near a big white cargo container which is in the tail of the plane. Several smaller yellow and orange containers are behind the white container. They are wrapped in netting. Some brown boxes under plastic are strapped down behind the other containers.

GUSTO

GUSTO is a scientific balloon mission that will measure emissions from the interstellar medium, the material between stars.

Image of 9 illustrated satellites against a blue atmospheric background with the title HelioSwarm and subtitle The Nature of Turbulence in Space Plasm

HelioSwarm

HelioSwarm mission will help improve our understanding of the dynamics of the Sun, the Sun-Earth connection, and the constantly changing…

HERMES spacecraft

HERMES

HERMES is and instrument package that will be placed upon the Gateway, an orbital outpost which will support Artemis lunar…

IMAP spacecraft artist's concept

IMAP

IINCUS diagram

INCUS

Pair of gloved hands holding a rectangular clear manifold containing two black square fluidic cards. Tubes filled with blue dye are connected to the manifold.

LEIA

LISA

Lunar Trailblazer

MAIA

Mars Sample Return

Mars Sample Return would be NASA’s most ambitious, multi-mission campaign that would bring carefully selected Martian samples to Earth for…

Spacecraft over Mars moon.

MMX

Japan's MMX (Martian Moons eXploration) will study Mars' small moons Phobos and Deimos, collect a sample of one of them…

Image of a spacecraft with an illustrated yellow to orange gradient sun in the background; the text reads Muse Observing the Sun's Extreme Ultraviolet Radiation

MUSE

The Multi-slit Solar Explorer (MUSE) mission will help scientists understand the forces driving the heating of the Sun’s corona and…

Artist Rendering of NISAR

NISAR

Artist's concept of PACE spacecraft

PACE

PACE will help us better understand our ocean and atmosphere by measuring key variables associated with cloud formation, particles and…

PREFIRE

PREFIRE measures a little-studied portion of the radiant energy emitted by Earth for clues about sea ice loss, ice-sheet melting,…

PUNCH

Q-PACE

Roman

Hardware Highlight : Fall 2023

SPHEREx

SunRISE

TSIS-2

VERITAS

Venus Orbiter

An artist's concept of NASA’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover

VIPER

Overview NASA’s Artemis lunar rover, the Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover, or VIPER, will explore the relatively nearby but extreme…

XRISM