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Latest Planetary Missions Program Office News

NASA Selects Participating Scientists to Join Lucy Asteroid Mission
2 min read

NASA has selected eight participating scientists to join its Lucy mission to the Jupiter Trojan asteroids. These asteroids are remnants of…

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NASA’s Lucy Spacecraft Takes Its 1st Images of Asteroid Donaldjohanson
3 min read

NASA’s Lucy spacecraft has its next flyby target, the small main belt asteroid  Donaldjohanson, in its sights. By blinking between…

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NASA’s Europa Clipper Uses Mars to Go the Distance
6 min read

The orbiter bound for Jupiter’s moon Europa will investigate whether the moon is habitable, but it first will get the…

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Is There Potential for Life on Europa? We Asked a NASA Expert: Episode 52
2 min read

That’s a great question. And it’s a question that NASA will seek to answer with the Europa Clipper spacecraft. Europa…

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En Route to Jupiter, NASA’s Europa Clipper Captures Images of Stars
4 min read

The spacecraft’s star trackers help engineers orient the orbiter throughout its long journey to Jupiter’s icy moon Europa. Three months…

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NASA’s InSight Finds Marsquakes From Meteoroids Go Deeper Than Expected
6 min read

With help from AI, scientists discovered a fresh crater made by an impact that shook material as deep as the…

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NASA’s Asteroid Bennu Sample Reveals Mix of Life’s Ingredients
6 min read

Lee esta nota de prensa en español aquí. Studies of rock and dust from asteroid Bennu delivered to Earth by…

News Release
NASA Juno Mission Spots Most Powerful Volcanic Activity on Io to Date
5 min read

Even by the standards of Io, the most volcanic celestial body in the solar system, recent events observed on the…

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NASA to Brief Media on Asteroid Sample Mission Findings
2 min read

NASA will brief media at 11 a.m. EST Wednesday, Jan. 29, to provide an update on science results from NASA’s…

News Release
Lab Work Digs Into Gullies Seen on Giant Asteroid Vesta by NASA’s Dawn
4 min read

Known as flow formations, these channels could be etched on bodies that would seem inhospitable to liquid because they are…

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NASA Mars Orbiter Spots Retired InSight Lander to Study Dust Movement
5 min read

New images taken from space show how dust on and around InSight is changing over time — information that can…

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NASA Kennedy Top 24 Stories of 2024
7 min read

From sending crew members to the International Space Station to launching a spacecraft to Jupiter’s icy moon Europa to determine…

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NASA’s Juno Mission Uncovers Heart of Jovian Moon’s Volcanic Rage
5 min read

A new study points to why, and how, Io became the most volcanic body in the solar system. Scientists with…

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NASA-Led Team Links Comet Water to Earth’s Oceans
5 min read

Scientists find that cometary dust affects interpretation of spacecraft measurements, reopening the case for comets like 67P as potential sources…

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NASA Awards Launch Services Contract for Dragonfly Mission
2 min read

NASA has selected SpaceX to provide launch services for the Dragonfly mission, a rotorcraft lander mission under NASA’s New Frontiers…

News Release
NASA’s Europa Clipper: Millions of Miles Down, Instruments Deploying
5 min read

Headed to Jupiter’s moon Europa, the spacecraft is operating without a hitch and will reach Mars in just three months…

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Precision Pointing Goes the Distance on NASA Experiment
4 min read

One year ago today, the future of space communications arrived at Earth as a beam of light from a NASA…

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Matthew Kowalewski: Aerospace Engineer and Curious About Everything
6 min read

Matthew Kowalewski describes himself as “curious about too many things,” but that curiosity comes in handy when engineering instrumentation scheduled…

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NASA’s New Edition of Graphic Novel Features Europa Clipper
2 min read

NASA has released a new edition of Issue 4 of the Astrobiology Graphic History series. The issue now includes NASA’s…

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NASA Technologies Named Among TIME Inventions of 2024
4 min read

As NASA continues to innovate for the benefit of humanity, agency inventions that use new structures to harness sunlight for…

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Europa Trek: NASA Offers a New Guided Tour of Jupiter’s Ocean Moon
3 min read

NASA Science Activation’s Solar System Treks collaborated with Astrobiology SciComm Guild SMEs to create enhancements to the Europa Trek portal.

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Liftoff! NASA’s Europa Clipper Sails Toward Ocean Moon of Jupiter
6 min read

NASA’s Europa Clipper has embarked on its long voyage to Jupiter, where it will investigate Europa, a moon with an…

News Release
Journey to a Water World: NASA’s Europa Clipper Is Ready to Launch
5 min read

Find details about the launch sequences for the orbiter, which is targeting an Oct. 14 liftoff on its mission to…

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Can Life Exist on an Icy Moon? NASA’s Europa Clipper Aims to Find Out
6 min read

With a spacecraft launching soon, the mission will try to answer the question of whether there are ingredients suitable for…

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NASA’s Hubble, New Horizons Team Up for a Simultaneous Look at Uranus
6 min read

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and New Horizons spacecraft simultaneously set their sights on Uranus recently, allowing scientists to make a…

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La NASA actualiza la cobertura de Europa Clipper tras el huracán Milton
7 min read

Nota del editor: Este comunicado se actualizó el 12 de octubre de 2024 para reflejar una nueva fecha de lanzamiento…

News Release
NASA Updates Coverage for Europa Clipper Following Hurricane Milton
5 min read

Editor’s note: This advisory was updated Oct. 13, 2024, to reflect a change in the start time for the prelaunch…

News Release
NASA’s Laser Comms Demo Makes Deep Space Record, Completes First Phase
5 min read

The Deep Space Optical Communications tech demo has completed several key milestones, culminating in sending a signal to Mars’ farthest…

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NASA’s Instruments Capture Sharpest Image of Earth’s Radiation Belt
4 min read

From Aug. 19-20, ESA’s (European Space Agency’s) Juice (Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer) mission made history with a daring lunar-Earth flyby…

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New Video Series Spotlights Engineers on NASA’s Europa Clipper Mission
4 min read

With NASA’s Europa Clipper just weeks away from launch, five short videos give a behind-the-scenes peek at some of the…

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8 Things to Know About NASA’s Mission to an Ocean Moon of Jupiter
6 min read

The first NASA spacecraft dedicated to studying an ocean world beyond Earth, Europa Clipper aims to find out if the…

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NASA Invites Media to Discuss Europa Clipper Mission
2 min read

NASA will hold a media teleconference at 4 p.m. EDT, Monday, Sept. 9, to provide an update on Europa Clipper,…

News Release
NASA Invites Media to View Launch of Jupiter Moon Mission
3 min read

NASA and SpaceX are targeting a launch period opening Thursday, Oct. 10, for the agency’s Europa Clipper mission, which will…

News Release
NASA Invites Social Creators to Experience Launch of Europa Clipper Mission
5 min read

Lee este artículo en español aquí   Digital content creators are invited to register to attend the launch of the…

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NASA’s Europa Clipper Gets Set of Super-Size Solar Arrays
5 min read

The largest spacecraft NASA has ever built for planetary exploration just got its ‘wings’ — massive solar arrays to power…

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NASA Shares Asteroid Bennu Sample in Exchange with JAXA
5 min read

As part of an asteroid sample exchange, NASA has transferred to JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) a portion of the…

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NASA’s DART Team Earns AIAA Space Systems Award for Pioneering Mission
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NASA’s DART (Double​ Asteroid Redirection Test) mission continues to yield scientific discoveries and garner accolades for its groundbreaking achievements. The mission team was…

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Danish Instrument Helps NASA’s Juno Spacecraft See Radiation
5 min read

Using cameras designed for navigation, scientists count ‘fireflies’ to determine the amount of radiation the spacecraft receives during each orbit…

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MESSENGER – From Setbacks to Success
20 min read

The excerpts below are taken from Discovery Program oral history interviews conducted in 2009 by Dr. Susan Niebur and tell…

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NASA’s DART Mission Sheds New Light on Target Binary Asteroid System
5 min read

In studying data collected from NASA’s DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) mission, which in 2022 sent a spacecraft to intentionally collide with the…

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UPDATED: 10 Things for Mars 10
4 min read

Scientists from around the world are gathering this week in California to take stock of the state of science from…

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Surprising Phosphate Finding in NASA’s OSIRIS-REx Asteroid Sample
6 min read

Scientists have eagerly awaited the opportunity to dig into the 4.3-ounce (121.6-gram) pristine asteroid Bennu sample collected by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx…

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NASA’s Juno Gets a Close-Up Look at Lava Lakes on Jupiter’s Moon Io
6 min read

Infrared imagery from the solar-powered spacecraft heats up the discussion on the inner workings of Jupiter’s hottest moon. New findings…

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NASA Selects Participating Scientists to Join ESA’s Hera Mission
3 min read

NASA has selected 12 participating scientists to join ESA’s (European Space Agency) Hera mission, which is scheduled to launch in…

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NASA, Partners Conduct Fifth Asteroid Impact Exercise, Release Summary
4 min read

For the benefit of all, NASA released a summary Thursday of the fifth biennial Planetary Defense Interagency Tabletop Exercise. NASA’s…

News Release
NASA Lucy Images Reveal Asteroid Dinkinesh to be Surprisingly Complex
4 min read

Images from the November 2023 flyby of asteroid Dinkinesh by NASA’s Lucy spacecraft show a trough on Dinkinesh where a…

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NASA to Measure Moonquakes With Help From InSight Mars Mission
6 min read

The technology behind the two seismometers that make up NASA’s Farside Seismic Suite was used to detect more than a…

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NASA’s OSIRIS-APEX Unscathed After Searing Pass of Sun
4 min read

Mission engineers were confident NASA’s OSIRIS-APEX (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification – Apophis Explorer) spacecraft could weather its closest ever…

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NASA’s Psyche Fires Up Its Sci-Fi-Worthy Thrusters
4 min read

The spacecraft already is beyond the distance of Mars and is using ion propulsion to accelerate toward a metal-rich asteroid,…

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NASA’s Juno Provides High-Definition Views of Europa’s Icy Shell
5 min read

Imagery from the solar-powered spacecraft shows some intriguing features on the ice-encased Jovian moon. Images from the JunoCam visible-light camera…

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