NASA’s SpaceX Crew‑12 Splashes Down, Sets Briefing to Discuss Mission

After more than seven months aboard the International Space Station, NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 mission safely splashed down Thursday in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Los Angeles. The crew members will discuss their science mission during a news conference at 3:30 p.m. EDT, Thursday, Oct. 15, at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

“Jessica, Jack, Sophie, and Andrey spent 237 days living and working in orbit, traveled more than 100 million miles, advanced important science, and returned safely home because of the extraordinary expertise and competence of thousands across NASA, SpaceX, and our international partners,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. “Building the capability, experience, and confidence to do this repeatedly is exactly what will allow us to go farther, and I am grateful to Crew-12 and their families for their service to humanity’s greatest adventure.”

NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev returned to Earth at 8:34 a.m. PDT. Teams aboard SpaceX recovery vessels retrieved the spacecraft and its crew shortly after. Following standard postflight medical screenings, the crew will fly to shore before returning to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

“NASA’s activities supporting the International Space Station — transporting crew, conducting impactful research, and maintaining critical national assets — enable the science, engineering, and risk‑reduction needed for future missions across the solar system,” said Dana Weigel, manager of NASA’s Low Earth Orbit Program at the agency’s Johnson Space Center. “We’re grateful for the dedication across the human spaceflight team that makes this possible, and we’re thrilled to welcome Jessica, Jack, Sophie, and Andrey home.”

During their 237-day mission, the four crew members traveled more than 100 million miles and completed more than 3,792 orbits around Earth. The mission was the second for Meir and Fedyaev and the first for Hathaway and Adenot. Crew-12 lifted off at 5:15 a.m. EST on Feb. 13 and docked to the orbiting laboratory a day later.

Crew‑12 logged hundreds of hours of scientific research to support human exploration beyond low Earth orbit and advance benefits for people on Earth. The crew members’ work included testing stem cell production for cell‑based therapies, demonstrating on‑demand IV fluid generation for future missions, and studying how the bacteria that causes pneumonia can lead to long‑term heart damage. The crew also conducted nutrition-focused research and examined how physical characteristics may affect blood flow during spaceflight to help keep astronauts safe and healthy on future missions. Research conducted aboard the space station advances knowledge and demonstrates new technologies that enable us to prepare for human exploration of the Moon and Mars.

Meir completed four spacewalks, bringing her career total to seven. That places her third all-time in total spacewalks among women at NASA, behind former agency astronauts Peggy Whitson and Suni Williams. Adenot completed three spacewalks, becoming the first French woman to venture outside the orbital outpost.

United States-based media interested in attending the crew news conference in person with Meir, Hathaway, and Fedyaev, must contact the NASA Johnson newsroom no later than 5 p.m. EDT, Tuesday, Oct. 13, at jsc-newsroom@mail.nasa.gov. Media joining by phone must request dial-in details by 9:30 a.m., Oct. 15. To ask a question, media must join no later than 15 minutes before the start of the news conference. The agency’s media credentialing policy is available online. Adenot will return to Europe and not be available during the news conference.

NASA’s Low Earth Orbit Program provides reliable access to space, maximizing the use of the International Space Station for research and development by partnering with private U.S. companies, including SpaceX, to transport astronauts to and from the space station.

Learn more about NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 at:

https://www.nasa.gov/commercialcrew

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Joshua Finch / Jimi Russell
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1100
joshua.a.finch@nasa.gov / james.j.russell@nasa.gov

Sandra Jones / Joseph Zakrzewski
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111
sandra.p.jones@nasa.gov / joseph.a.zakrzewski@nasa.gov

Steven Siceloff
Kennedy Space Center, Florida
321-867-2468
steven.p.siceloff@nasa.gov

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Lauren E. Low

NASA, Energy Department Advance New Era of Nuclear-Powered Exploration

As the Golden Age of deep-space exploration begins, NASA and the U.S. Department of Energy are advancing the development of safe, reliable, next-generation nuclear technologies for space.

Together, the agencies will supercharge civil space exploration, unlock bold scientific discovery, and solidify American leadership in space nuclear power and propulsion. 

“We are entering the ‘Nuclear NASA-era,’ which represents a major transformation for space exploration,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. “Nuclear power will allow us to go farther, operate longer, and field more capable spacecraft and instruments than ever before. The work we’re doing today is laying the foundation for the fission-powered spacecraft of tomorrow and opening an entirely new frontier for exploration and discovery.”

The new Memorandum of Understanding, “Accelerating American Leadership in Space Nuclear Power and Propulsion,” was signed Thursday between NASA and DOE, and establishes a framework for end-to-end collaboration. The agreement unites both agencies across the full spectrum of space nuclear development, spanning advanced research and fuel production to rigorous testing, launch integration, and operations. Across all these efforts, an uncompromising commitment to safety remains the central pillar.

The signing took place between Isaacman and U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright during the Golden Age Summit, hosted by the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace in Washington, and is effective Sunday, Nov. 1.

“Thanks to President Trump, America’s nuclear renaissance is reaching a new frontier,” said Wright. “The Energy Department is proud to partner with NASA as we help American space missions reach uncharted territory.”

President Trump’s December 2025 Executive Order on Ensuring American Space Superiority directs NASA to develop a launch-ready lunar surface reactor by 2030, a goal toward which NASA, partnering with DOE, is making steady progress. This pivotal agreement fortifies existing collaborations on fission and radioisotope power systems, propelling NASA’s vision for a sustained human presence on the Moon and accelerating the breakthrough technologies to enable our mission.

When NASA’s Space Reactor‑1 Freedom launches in 2028, nuclear propulsion will advance from laboratory research to operational deep‑space application. This milestone paves the way for Lunar Reactor‑1, the fission surface power system that will sustain the future Moon Base through darkness and shadow. Nuclear power will energize habitats, communications, instruments, rovers, resource usage, and critical lunar infrastructure, and it will be essential for the demanding energy needs of future Mars missions.

Together, SR‑1 and LR‑1 form the foundation of a robust domestic nuclear‑space industrial base. These programs are poised to power permanent lunar outposts, enable exploration of distant worlds, and cement American leadership in space for generations. These endeavors will expand humanity’s reach toward Mars, reinforce American preeminence in deep space, and pioneer innovative technologies that yield benefits here on Earth.

In addition to fission power, NASA continues to expand its use of radioisotope power systems. The Dragonfly mission to Saturn’s moon Titan, scheduled for launch in 2028, will rely on a Multi‑Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator and 24 Light Weight Radioisotope Heater Units to power and warm the car‑sized rotorcraft. Dragonfly will fly to various locations on Saturn’s moon Titan and investigate the moon’s habitability.

NASA and DOE additionally plan to support ESA’s (European Space Agency) Rosalind Franklin Mars rover studying the potential for past and current life on the Red Planet, by providing 24 similar heater units to maintain instrument temperatures in the extreme cold of the Martian environment.

To learn about Nuclear NASA, visit:

https://www.nasa.gov/ignition

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Camille Gallo / Elizabeth Shaw  
Headquarters, Washington  
202-358-1600  
camille.m.gallo@nasa.gov / elizabeth.a.shaw@nasa.gov

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Gerelle Q. Dodson

NASA Advances LISA Mission Contributions With New Test Telescope

NASA has taken the next step in the process of developing a new all-glass telescope for the LISA (Laser Interferometer Space Antenna) mission, a space observatory designed to detect ripples in space-time called gravitational waves.

L3Harris Technologies will design, assemble, and integrate the new telescope for NASA. Called the Engineering Test Unit, this contribution represents a final step toward the future production of flight hardware. 

Led by ESA (European Space Agency), the LISA mission is slated for launch in the mid-2030s. As a collaborative partner, NASA is contributing the telescopes, other critical hardware, and engineering and scientific support as part of its mission to better understand how the universe works.

The LISA mission will deploy a trio of satellites into an Earth-following orbit, creating a vast triangular array stretching 1.6 million miles (2.5 million kilometers) on each side. Each satellite will include two telescopes that will use infrared laser beams to simultaneously transmit and receive signals between adjacent spacecraft. Through these telescopes, the spacecraft will measure miniscule changes in their relative distances, the signals of passing gravitational waves.  

“These changes are tiny, smaller than the width of a helium atom, but through them LISA will reveal a sea of low-frequency gravitational waves that we cannot currently detect through facilities on Earth,” said Ira Thorpe, the NASA project scientist for the mission at the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “The LISA mission will be able to detect mergers of monster black holes billions of light-years away, map compact pairs of white dwarfs, neutron stars, and stellar-mass black holes in our own cosmic backyard, and perhaps provide new insights into gravity itself.”    

Each telescope will be entirely made of an amber-colored ceramic-glass composite called Zerodur, which is widely used in high-precision applications because it resists changes in shape across a wide range of temperatures. In 2024, L3Harris delivered a prototype telescope to NASA that served as an engineering development unit for this next step.

“We’ve put the prototype through rigorous testing, and we’re bringing everything we’ve learned into this new telescope,” said Ritva Keski-Kuha, lead for the LISA Telescope program at NASA Goddard. “This will be our last pre-flight unit and our first optical telescope delivery to ESA.” Earlier this year, in June, the team delivered a structural model of the telescope made from metal instead of glass.

Gravitational waves were predicted by Albert Einstein’s 1916 general theory of relativity and first detected by ground-based observatories in 2015. The waves form whenever massive objects accelerate, such as two stars in orbit around each other. They flow across space-time, moving at the speed of light, and are unaffected by objects they encounter along the way. These properties make them a valuable tool for probing the cosmos.

Each of the three LISA spacecraft contains a free-floating gold-platinum cube called a proof mass. The spacecraft will fly around the cube and manage its environment so the cube falls through space only under the influence of gravity. In 2016, ESA’s LISA Pathfinder mission showed that it was possible to reduce non-gravitational forces on the proof masses to the level needed for gravitational wave detection.

Additional NASA contributions include the laser system, devices to manage the buildup of electric charge on the proof masses, data analysis for identifying and characterizing individual gravitational wave sources, and additional scientific and engineering expertise.

To learn more about the LISA mission, visit:

https://nasa.gov/lisa

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