NASA, GE Aerospace Hybrid Engine System Marks Successful Test 

To an untrained eye, the aircraft engine sitting outside of a Cincinnati facility in December might have looked like standard hardware. But NASA and GE Aerospace researchers watching the unit fire up for a demonstration knew what they were looking at: a hybrid engine performing at a level that could potentially power an airliner.  

It’s something new in the aviation world, and the result of years of research and development. 

NASA, GE Aerospace, and others working toward hybrid engine development had already tested components in the past — power system controls, electric motors, and more. What the demonstration at GE Aerospace’s Peebles Test Operation site in Ohio represented was the first test of an integrated system.  

“Turbines already exist. Compressors already exist. But there is no hybrid-electric engine flying today. And that’s what we were able to see,” said Anthony Nerone, who served as manager of the agency’s Hybrid Thermally Efficient Core (HyTEC) project at NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland during the test engine’s development. 

The test involved a modified GE Aerospace’s Passport engine with the ability to extract energy from some of its operations and insert that supplementary power into other parts. 

The hybrid engine is result of research from GE Aerospace and NASA under a cost-sharing HyTEC contract. It runs on jet fuel with assistance from electric motors, a concept that seems simple in a world where hybrid cars are common. Yet the execution was complex, requiring researchers to invent, adapt, and integrate parts into a system that could deliver the requisite power needed for a single-aisle aircraft safely and reliably.  

As a result, the demonstration — known as a power extraction test — was one of the most complex GE Aerospace has staged to date. 

“They had to integrate equipment they’ve never needed for previous tests like this,” said Laura Evans, acting HyTEC project manager at Glenn.  

Despite the complexity, the team witnessed a successful demonstration. Not a balancing test or a preliminary exercise, but an engine on a mount doing many of the things it would need to do if installed in an aircraft. 

The test comes at a time when U.S. aviation is increasingly looking for power systems that can do more while also saving money on fuel. It’s a trend NASA was well ahead of. Hybrid aircraft engine technology began to emerge from Glenn roughly 20 years ago, when it seemed nearly impossible to realize, Nerone said.  

“Now,” he said. “When you go to a conference, hybrid technology is everywhere.”

And NASA and GE now have real data for how the technology can be applied to flight. 

From that early start, NASA transitioned into HyTEC and its contract with GE Aerospace.  

HyTEC’s goal is to mature technology that will enable a hybrid engine that burns up to 10% less fuel compared to today’s best-in-class engines. NASA’s overall goal is to leverage its resources to bring the technology to market faster, meeting industry needs. 

The work is far from over. Both NASA and GE Aerospace are analyzing data from the demonstration and from previous work and are making progress toward a compact engine test this decade.  

Still, the demonstration was a chance to see the integration of technology that’s closer than ever to practical application. 

“We’re getting close to the payoff on work that’d been in progress for a long time,” Nerone said.  

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NASA Welcomes Oman as Newest Artemis Accords Signatory

The Sultanate of Oman signed the Artemis Accords during a ceremony in Muscat attended by NASA on Monday, becoming the 61st nation to commit to responsible space exploration for the benefit of all humanity.

“Oman’s accession to the Artemis Accords sets an important example about the value of responsible behavior and shared pursuit of discovery,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman in recorded remarks during the ceremony. “Oman joins the U.S. and our other partners on ensuring the peaceful exploration of space for generations to come. We are returning humans to the Moon and laying the groundwork for future missions. A community of like-minded nations will be the foundation of our success.”

U.S. Ambassador to the Sultanate of Oman Ana Escrogima and NASA’s Deputy Associate Administrator Casey Swails participated in the event held on the opening day of the Middle East Space Conference, an international forum on space and innovation in the region. Said al-Maawali, Oman’s minister of transportation, communication, and information technology signed on behalf of the country.

In 2020, during the first Trump Administration, the United States, led by NASA and the U.S. Department of State, joined with seven other founding nations to establish the Artemis Accords, responding to the growing interest in lunar activities by both governments and private companies.

The accords introduced the first set of practical principles aimed at enhancing the safety, transparency, and coordination of civil space exploration on the Moon, Mars, and beyond.

Signing the Artemis Accords means to explore peaceably and transparently, to render aid to those in need, to enable access to scientific data that all of humanity can learn from, to ensure activities do not interfere with those of others, to preserve historically significant sites and artifacts, and to develop best practices for how to conduct space exploration activities for the benefit of all.

More countries are expected to sign the Artemis Accords in the months and years ahead, as NASA continues its work to establish a safe, peaceful, and prosperous future in space.

Learn more about the Artemis Accords at:

https://www.nasa.gov/artemis-accords

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Bethany Stevens / Elizabeth Shaw
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
bethany.c.stevens@nasa.gov / elizabeth.a.shaw@nasa.gov

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Jessica Taveau

NASA Technology Brings Golden Age of Exploration to Earth

As NASA fosters technologies needed to live and work farther away from home than ever before, the agency’s Technology Transfer program has the sole mission of getting those innovations into the hands of companies, entrepreneurs, and, ultimately, everyday people. The agency’s Spinoff publication has captured this endeavor for half a century, sharing stories of space technologies improving our lives on Earth.

“NASA’s work has always delivered returns well beyond the mission itself,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. “As we develop the technologies needed for a sustained presence on the Moon and prepare for human exploration of Mars, those innovations will continue to unlock new capabilities across medicine, aviation, agriculture, and other critical sectors, delivering lasting benefits to Earth well beyond the mission.”

Many technologies created to support deep space and lunar missions, including Artemis, are in use on Earth. Spinoff’s 50th edition tells the stories of two companies that developed equipment to 3D print habitats on planetary surfaces. On Earth, one of those companies is custom-building wall panels, cladding, and facades, while the other is additively manufacturing entire neighborhoods of affordable housing.

NASA envisions a future where robots handle routine maintenance and mundane tasks to support astronauts during lunar missions. Two companies featured in Spinoff 2026  received the agency’s support to meet that need, and each has already found applications for their technology on Earth. One company is commercializing software to power robots that are cleaning bathrooms and building homes, and the other has created a humanoid robot capable of warehouse and assembly line tasks.

“Incredible feats on distant worlds require incredible innovation,” said Dan Lockney, Technology Transfer program executive at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “We can’t wait to see what breakthroughs and advancements come from not just exploration on the lunar surface but missions to put a rotorcraft on Saturn’s moon Titan or study interstellar objects in deep space.”

Any NASA work can result in spinoff technology, including lifesaving inventions. Technology developed by engineers trying to make life easier for astronauts on the International Space Station has evolved into an implantable heart monitor that’s helping keep heart failure patients out of the hospital. Companies also are improving personal locator beacons for search and rescue networks based on NASA’s satellite communication technology.

Standout spinoffs

Procedures NASA created to ensure food safety for Apollo astronauts traveling to the Moon formed the foundation for safety procedures and regulations governing food production globally. The memory foam found in mattresses today originated from NASA’s development of pressure-absorbing materials for aircraft seats in the 1970s. Miniaturized, energy-efficient camera technology, initially engineered by NASA to create compact, high-quality imaging systems for spacecraft, is now the basis for modern digital imagery, from smartphone cameras to cinema. Scratch-resistant lenses use diamond-hard coatings originally developed for aerospace applications, and wireless headsets are rooted in technology NASA pioneered to enable hands-free communication for astronauts.

Readers of Spinoff 2026 are invited to contribute to the next “small step” in NASA’s history of “giant leaps” and bring space-inspired technology to Earth. In this edition’s Spinoffs of Tomorrow section, there are 20 technologies ready for commercialization, with information on how to license them or any of the other 1,300 inventions available in NASA’s Patent Portfolio.

Spinoff is part of NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate and its Technology Transfer program. Technology Transfer is charged with finding broad, innovative applications for NASA-developed technology through partnerships and licensing agreements, ensuring agency investments benefit the nation and the world.

To read NASA’s 50th edition of Spinoff, visit:

https://go.nasa.gov/4t5Xv12

-end-

Jasmine Hopkins
Headquarters, Washington
321-432-4624
jasmine.s.hopkins@nasa.gov

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Tiernan P. Doyle

How NASA Is Homing in From Space on Ocean Debris

Space-based technology could help track plastic and other flotsam by its ‘fingerprints.’

In late 2025, scientists reported that, for the first time, they were able to detect concentrations of plastic pollution on land using NASA’s Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation (EMIT) sensor aboard the International Space Station. The technology has inspired marine researchers to see whether it could also help track debris in our waters.

Before future generations of sensors like EMIT can be called upon to detect ocean litter, scientists need to know what to look for. Working with collaborators, NASA intern Ashley Ohall has built a newly published reference library containing nearly 25,000 molecular “fingerprints” from all manner of flotsam and jetsam, including rope, tires, metal, bubble wrap, buoys, and bottle caps. Given the overwhelming presence of plastic in marine debris, the library includes some 19 types of polymer.

Most of the estimated 8 million tons or more of plastic that enter the ocean every year comes from land, so mapping pollution hot spots near coastlines could be a first step toward reducing what ends up on beaches and washed out to sea. That’s exactly what NASA’s sensor showed it could do, though detecting plastic wasn’t its first mission. Launched in 2022, EMIT maps minerals across desert regions to help determine how the dust can heat or cool the atmosphere.

But the instrument has proved itself incredibly nimble. From its perch on the space station, it can identify hundreds of compounds on Earth via the unique spectral patterns they make in reflected sunlight. The technology behind EMIT, called imaging spectroscopy, was pioneered at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California and is used on missions throughout the solar system. One of EMIT’s cousins discovered lunar water in 2009, and another is set to return to the Moon to help future astronauts identify scientifically valuable areas to sample.

The same technology has now shown that it can find plastic compounds in landfills and large-scale structures like greenhouses, said JPL’s David Thompson, who coauthored the 2025 study. However, detecting plastic once it enters the ocean is more challenging: Seawater absorbs infrared light, masking many of plastic’s prominent spectral features.

Litter library

That’s where the work of Ohall and her collaborators comes in. Their open-source library compiles the work of many researchers over the years who’ve analyzed marine debris using handheld instruments in laboratories. Standardizing the various datasets into one searchable repository is crucial because different kinds of debris have slightly different spectra based on material, color, and condition. Weathered water bottles, for example, “look” different than washed-up hurricane detritus. Once the patterns are known, detection algorithms can be developed.

Carried by ocean currents, debris can travel thousands of miles from the source, so a better understanding of where it is and where it’s headed could be a boon for public health and coastal tourism, said Ohall, a Florida native who recently graduated from the University of Georgia.

“My biggest hope is that people see remote sensing as an important and useful tool for marine debris monitoring,” Ohall said. “Just because it hasn’t been done yet doesn’t mean it can’t be done.”

Planet-scale challenge

Conventional methods for quantifying plastic in the ocean — including dragging nets through garbage patches — can’t sample the millions of tons that flow in. With NASA’s support, scientists are learning more about the ability of existing sensors as well as what’s still needed to spot marine debris. Teams are also training AI tools to sift through satellite imagery.

It remains a planet-scale endeavor, said Kelsey Bisson, a program manager at NASA Headquarters in Washington. The groundwork being done by Ohall and other scientists brings us a step closer to leveraging a powerful technology flying in air and space today.

“Humans have a visceral connection to the ocean and its health,” Bisson said. “Detecting marine debris is the kind of incredible challenge that NASA can help solve.”

To learn more about EMIT, visit:

https://earth.jpl.nasa.gov/emit/

Media Contacts

Andrew Wang / Andrew Good
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
626-379-6874 / 818-393-2433
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Written by Sally Younger

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NASA Reveals New Details About Dark Matter’s Influence on Universe

With the Webb telescope’s unprecedented sensitivity, scientists are learning more about dark matter’s influence on stars, galaxies, and even planets like Earth.

Scientists using data from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have made one of the most detailed, high-resolution maps of dark matter ever produced. It shows how the invisible, ghostly material overlaps and intertwines with “regular” matter, the stuff that makes up stars, galaxies, and everything we can see.

Published Monday, Jan. 26, in Nature Astronomy, the map builds on previous research to provide additional confirmation and new details about how dark matter has shaped the universe on the largest scales — galaxy clusters millions of light-years across — that ultimately give rise to galaxies, stars, and planets like Earth.

“This is the largest dark matter map we’ve made with Webb, and it’s twice as sharp as any dark matter map made by other observatories,” said Diana Scognamiglio, lead author of the paper and an astrophysicist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “Previously, we were looking at a blurry picture of dark matter. Now we’re seeing the invisible scaffolding of the universe in stunning detail, thanks to Webb’s incredible resolution.”

Dark matter doesn’t emit, reflect, absorb, or even block light, and it passes through regular matter like a ghost. But it does interact with the universe through gravity, something the map shows with a new level of clarity. Evidence for this interaction lies in the degree of overlap between dark matter and regular matter. According to the paper’s authors, Webb’s observations confirm that this close alignment can’t be a coincidence but, rather, is due to dark matter’s gravity pulling regular matter toward it throughout cosmic history.

“Wherever we see a big cluster of thousands of galaxies, we also see an equally massive amount of dark matter in the same place. And when we see a thin string of regular matter connecting two of those clusters, we see a string of dark matter as well,” said Richard Massey, an astrophysicist at Durham University in the United Kingdom and a coauthor of the new study. “It’s not just that they have the same shapes. This map shows us that dark matter and regular matter have always been in the same place. They grew up together.”

Closer look

Found in the constellation Sextans, the area covered by the new map is a section of sky about 2.5 times larger than the full Moon. A global community of scientists have observed this region with at least 15 ground- and space-based telescopes for the Cosmic Evolution Survey (COSMOS). Their goal: to precisely measure the location of regular matter here and then compare it to the location of dark matter. The first dark matter map of the area was made in 2007 using data from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, a project led by Massey and JPL astrophysicist Jason Rhodes, a coauthor of the paper.

Webb peered at this region for a total of about 255 hours and identified nearly 800,000 galaxies, some of which were detected for the first time. Scognamiglio and her colleagues then looked for dark matter by observing how its mass curves space itself, which in turn bends the light traveling to Earth from distant galaxies. When observed by researchers, it’s as if the light of those galaxies has passed through a warped windowpane.

The Webb map contains about 10 times more galaxies than maps of the area made by ground-based observatories and twice as many as Hubble’s. It reveals new clumps of dark matter and captures a higher-resolution view of the areas previously seen by Hubble.

To refine measurements of the distance to many galaxies for the map, the team used Webb’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), designed and managed through launch by JPL, along with other space- and ground-based telescopes. The wavelengths that MIRI detects also make it adept at detecting galaxies obscured by cosmic dust clouds.

Why it matters

When the universe began, regular matter and dark matter were probably sparsely distributed. Scientists think dark matter began to clump together first and that those dark matter clumps then pulled together regular matter, creating regions with enough material for stars and galaxies to begin to form.

In this way, dark matter determined the large-scale distribution of galaxies in the universe. And by prompting galaxy and star formation to begin earlier than they would have otherwise, dark matter’s influence also played a role in creating the conditions for planets to eventually form. That’s because the first generations of stars were responsible for turning hydrogen and helium — which made up the vast majority of atoms in the early universe — into the rich array of elements that now compose planets like Earth. In other words, dark matter provided more time for complex planets to form.

“This map provides stronger evidence that without dark matter, we might not have the elements in our galaxy that allowed life to appear,” said Rhodes. “Dark matter is not something we encounter in our everyday life on Earth, or even in our solar system, but it has definitely influenced us.”

Scognamiglio and some of her coauthors will also map dark matter with NASA’s upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope over an area 4,400 times bigger than the COSMOS region. Roman’s primary science goals include learning more about dark matter’s fundamental properties and how they may or may not have changed over cosmic history. But Roman’s maps won’t beat Webb’s spatial resolution. More detailed looks at dark matter will be possible only with a next-generation telescope like the Habitable Worlds Observatory, NASA’s next astrophysics flagship concept.

More about Webb

The James Webb Space Telescope is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).

To learn more about Webb, visit:

https://science.nasa.gov/webb

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Calla Cofield / Ian O’Neill
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