Artemis II Astronauts View SLS Core Stage at Michoud
NASA / Michael DeMocker
Artemis II NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman and Christina Koch of NASA, and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen view the core stage for the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket at the agency’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans on Nov. 16. The three astronauts, along with NASA’s Victor Glover, will launch atop the rocket stage to venture around the Moon on Artemis II, the first crewed flight for Artemis.
The SLS core stage, towering at 212 feet, is the backbone of the Moon rocket and includes two massive propellant tanks that collectively hold 733,000 gallons of propellant to help power the stage’s four RS-25 engines. NASA, Boeing, the core stage lead contractor, along with Aerojet Rocketdyne, an L3Harris Technologies company and the RS-25 engines lead contractor, are in the midst of conducting final integrated testing on the fully assembled rocket stage. At launch and during ascent to space, the Artemis astronauts inside NASA’s Orion spacecraft will feel the power of the rocket’s four RS-25 engines producing more than 2 million pounds of thrust for a full eight minutes. The mega rocket’s twin solid rocket boosters, which flank either side of the core stage, will each add an additional 3.6 million pounds of thrust for two minutes.
NASA / Michael DeMocker
The astronauts’ visit to Michoud coincided with the first anniversary of the launch of Artemis I. The uncrewed flight test of SLS and Orion was the first in a series of increasingly complex missions for Artemis as the agency works to return humans to the lunar surface and develop a long-term presence there for discovery and exploration.
NASA is working to land the first woman and first person of color on the Moon under Artemis. SLS is part of NASA’s backbone for deep space exploration, along with the Orion spacecraft, advanced spacesuits and rovers, the Gateway in orbit around the Moon, and commercial human landing systems. SLS is the only rocket that can send Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single mission.
News Media Contact
Corinne Beckinger Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. 256.544.0034 corinne.m.beckinger@nasa.gov
NASA Mission Excels at Spotting Greenhouse Gas Emission Sources
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NASA Mission Excels at Spotting Greenhouse Gas Emission Sources
Flaring, in which excess natural gas is intentionally burned into the air, is one way methane is released from oil and gas facilities. NASA’s EMIT mission, in more than a year in operation, has shown a proficiency at spotting emissions of methane and other greenhouse gases from space.
Adobe Stock/Ilya Glovatskiy
Since launching 16 months ago, the EMIT imaging spectrometer aboard the International Space Station has shown an ability to detect more than just surface minerals.
More than a year after first detecting methane plumes from its perch aboard the International Space Station, data from NASA’s EMIT instrument is now being used to identify point-source emissions of greenhouse gases with a proficiency that has surprised even its designers.
Short for Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation, EMIT was launched in July 2022 to map 10 key minerals on the surface of the world’s arid regions. Those mineral-related observations, which are already available to researchers and the public, will help improve understanding of how dust that gets lofted into the atmosphere affects climate.
Detecting methane was not part of EMIT’s primary mission, but the instrument’s designers did expect the imaging spectrometer to have the capability. Now, with more than 750 emissions sources identified since August 2022 – some small, others in remote locations, and others persistent in time – the instrument has more than delivered in that regard, according to a new study published in Science Advances.
“We were a little cautious at first about what we could do with the instrument,” said Andrew Thorpe, a research technologist on the EMIT science team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California and the paper’s lead author. “It has exceeded our expectations.”
EMIT identified a cluster of 12 methane plumes within a 150-square-mile (400-square-kilometer) area of southern Uzbekistan on Sept. 1, 2022. The instrument captured the cluster within a single shot, called a scene by researchers.
NASA/JPL-Caltech
By knowing where methane emissions are coming from, operators of landfills, agriculture sites, oil and gas facilities, and other methane producers have an opportunity to address them. Tracking human-caused emissions of methane is key to limiting climate change because it offers a comparatively low-cost, rapid approach to reducing greenhouse gases. Methane lingers in the atmosphere for about a decade, but during this span, it’s up to 80 times more powerful at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, which remains for centuries.
Surprising Results
EMIT has proven effective at spotting emission sources both big (tens of thousands of pounds of methane per hour) and surprisingly small (down to the hundreds of pounds of methane per hour). This is important because it permits identification of a greater number of “super-emitters” – sources that produce disproportionate shares of total emissions.
The new study documents how EMIT, based on its first 30 days of greenhouse gas detection, can observe 60% to 85% of the methane plumes typically seen in airborne campaigns.
In a remote corner of southeastern Libya, EMIT on Sept. 3, 2022, detected a methane plume that was emitting about 979 pounds (444 kilograms) per hour. It’s one of the smallest sources detected so far by the instrument.
NASA/JPL-Caltech
From several thousand feet above the ground, methane-detecting instruments on aircraft are more sensitive, but to warrant sending a plane, researchers need prior indication that they’ll detect methane. Many areas are not examined because they are considered too remote, too risky, or too costly. Additionally, the campaigns that do occur cover relatively limited areas for short periods.
On the other hand, from about 250 miles (400 kilometers) altitude on the space station, EMIT collects data over a large swath of the planet – specifically the arid regions that fall between 51.6 degrees north and south latitude. The imaging spectrometer captures 50-mile-by-50-mile (80-kilometer-by-80-kilometer) images of the surface – researchers call them “scenes” – including many regions that have been beyond the reach of airborne instruments.
This time-lapse video shows the Canadarm2 robotic arm of the International Space Station maneuvering NASA’s EMIT mission onto the exterior of the station. Extraction from the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft began around 5:15 p.m. PDT on July 22 and was completed at 10:15 a.m. PDT on July 24. Portions of the installation have been omitted, while others have been speeded up. Credit: NASA
“The number and scale of methane plumes measured by EMIT around our planet is stunning,” said Robert O. Green, a JPL senior research scientist and EMIT’s principal investigator.
Scene-by-Scene Detections
To support source identification, the EMIT science team creates maps of methane plumes and releases them on a website, with underlying data available at the joint NASA-United States Geological Survey Land Processes Distributed Active Archive Center (LP DAAC). The mission’s data is available for use by the public, scientists, and organizations.
Since EMIT began collecting observations in August 2022, it has documented over 50,000 scenes. The instrument spotted a cluster of emissions sources in a rarely studied region of southern Uzbekistan on Sept. 1, 2022, detecting 12 methane plumes totaling about 49,734 pounds (22,559 kilograms) per hour.
In addition, the instrument has spotted plumes far smaller than expected. Captured in a remote corner of southeastern Libya on Sept. 3, 2022, one of the smallest sources so far was emitting 979 pounds (444 kilograms) per hour, based on estimates of local wind speed.
More About the Mission
EMIT was selected from the Earth Venture Instrument-4 solicitation under the Earth Science Division of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate and was developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is managed for the agency by Caltech in Pasadena, California. The instrument’s data is available at the NASA Land Processes Distributed Active Archive Center for use by other researchers and the public.
NASA Researcher Honored by Goddard Tech Office for Earth Science Work
Earth science researcher Dr. Antonia Gambacorta earned the 2023 Goddard IRAD Technology Leadership award for pioneering new ways to measure lower layers of Earth’s atmosphere from space.
The award from the chief technologist of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, recognizes Gambacorta’s work demonstrating how hyperspectral microwave sounding, the measurement of hundreds of thousands of wavelengths of microwave light, could dissect Earth’s atmospheric planetary boundary layer (PBL). She also conceptualized a microwave photonics radiometer instrument to reveal these measurements.
NASA / Christopher Gunn
The part of Earth’s atmosphere people live in, and have the most experience studying, is the hardest to measure from space due to the volume and complex behavior of the air above it, Gambacorta said. Developing the ability to probe and measure the boundary layer on a global, routine basis is important to better understanding its connections to the rest of our atmosphere, the land surface, and the oceans.
“The unique challenge of the PBL requires a novel path forward that will bring together traditionally disparate observing system components in order to enable transformative scientific advances in Earth system science,” said fellow researcher Joseph Santanello. “To that end, Dr. Gambacorta’s efforts extend beyond individual technology developments, and are represented in her aspirational vision of PBL sounding as ‘the tie that binds.’ Just as notably, Dr. Gambacorta’s passion, enthusiasm, and respect for her colleagues has been evident through each of stage of the project’s development.”
In seeking solutions to measure the boundary layer, Gambacorta stepped up to lead Goddard’s hyperspectral microwave projects and became the face of the center’s Decadal Survey Incubation (DSI) efforts. Through multiple Internal Research and Development, or IRAD grants, she and her team performed fundamental research to show the effectiveness of hyperspectral microwave sounding, conceptualized a microwave photonics radiometer instrument, and more recently began developing a framework to integrate data from multiple sensors for boundary layer science observations.
Photonics Integrated Chips like this one being tested in a Goddard Lab will be able to translate microwave signals into infrared light for more efficient processing of more wavelengths than current technology. This chip can process thousands of microwave bandwidths compared to existing, much larger processors.
NASA / Christopher Gunn
“Antonia’s innovation rises above her individual successes as a capable and creative innovator,” said Goddard Chief Technologist Peter Hughes. “She capitalized on multiple programs to incubate new technology while engaging expertise from across agencies and around the world to connect to other resources.”
Her cutting-edge innovations and research earned support from NASA’s Earth Science Technology Office and from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Specifically, Gambacorta built on her IRAD successes to secure an Earth Science Technology Office Instrument Incubator Program (IIP) project award to further develop her team’s microwave photonics radiometer concept and DSI funding to advance the multi-sensor fusion framework. Additionally, her momentum enabled a DSI-funded airborne instrument project attempting to transform CoSMIR, Goddard’s Conical Scanning Millimeter-wave Radiometer, into a hyperspectral sensor. That project is led by up-and-coming instrument scientist Rachael Kroodsma.
This entire portfolio that Gambacorta now manages also culminated in a successful NOAA Broad Agency Announcement proposal to demonstrate hyperspectral microwave radiometry. Through her engagement with colleagues in ESTO, NOAA, and the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites, Hughes said Goddard’s hyperspectral microwave and PBL initiatives are regarded globally as the trusted strategy for understanding the planetary boundary layer. Goddard is widely viewed as a pioneer in the use of integrated photonics for Earth remote sensing due to Gambacorta’s leadership, he added.
“Antonia serves as a true inspiration to the technologists and scientists on her teams,” her colleague Santanello added. “Her innovation and contribution to Goddard and the larger community can also be measured in each of these ways.”
By Karl B. Hille
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility supported the launch of two suborbital sounding rockets on Nov. 15, 2023, for Navy Strategic Systems Programs (SSP), and the Missile Defense Agency (MDA), in coordination with Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division (NSWC Crane) and the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s Test Resource Management Center (TRMC) Multi-Service Advanced Capability Hypersonic Test Bed (MACH TB).
This subscale test was executed by Sandia National Laboratories. Data collected from this test will be used to inform the development of the Navy’s Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS), MDA’s hypersonic defensive capability, and to mature other hypersonic technologies.
A three-stage sounding rocket launched from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia Nov. 15, 2023.
The Heat is On! NASA’s “Flawless” Heat Shield Demo Passes the Test
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The Heat is On! NASA’s “Flawless” Heat Shield Demo Passes the Test
The Low-Earth Orbit Flight Test of an Inflatable Decelerator, or LOFTID, spacecraft is pictured after its atmospheric re-entry test in November 2022.
Credits: NASA / Greg Swanson
A little more than a year ago, a NASA flight test article came screaming back from space at more than 18,000 mph, reaching temperatures of nearly 2,700 degrees Fahrenheit before gently splashing down in the Pacific Ocean. At that moment, it became the largest blunt body — a type of reentry vehicle that creates a heat-deflecting shockwave — ever to reenter Earth’s atmosphere.
The Low-Earth Orbit Flight Test of an Inflatable Decelerator (LOFTID) launched on Nov. 10, 2022, aboard a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket and successfully demonstrated an inflatable heat shield. Also known as a Hypersonic Inflatable Aerodynamic Decelerator (HIAD) aeroshell, this technology could allow larger spacecraft to safely descend through the atmospheres of celestial bodies like Mars, Venus, and even Saturn’s moon, Titan.
“Large-diameter aeroshells allow us to deliver critical support hardware, and potentially even crew, to the surface of planets with atmospheres. This capability is crucial for the nation’s ambition of expanding human and robotic exploration across our solar system,” said Trudy Kortes, director of the Technology Demonstrations Missions (TDM) program within the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
NASA has been developing HIAD technologies for over a decade, including two smaller scale suborbital flight tests before LOFTID. In addition to this successful tech demo, NASA is investigating future applications, including partnering with commercial companies to develop technologies for small satellite reentry, aerocapture, and cislunar payloads.
“This was a keystone event for us, and the short answer is: It was highly successful,” said LOFTID Project Manager Joe Del Corso. “Our assessment of LOFTID concluded with the promise of what this technology may do to empower the exploration of deep space.”
Due to the success of the LOFTID tech demo, NASA announced under its Tipping Point program that it would partner with ULA to develop and deliver the “next size up,” a larger 12-meter HIAD aeroshell for recovering the company’s Vulcan engines from low Earth orbit for reuse.
A Successful Test in the Books, A Video Recap
The LOFTID team recently held a post-flight analysis assessment of the flight test at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. Their verdict?
Upon recovery, the team discovered LOFTID appeared pristine, with minimal damage, meaning its performance was, as Del Corso puts it, “Just flawless.”
Here are some interesting visual highlights from LOFTID’s flight test.
NASA
To get to atmospheric reentry, LOFTID had to go through an intricate sequence of events. Del Corso compared it to a Rube Goldberg device, a complex machine designed to carry out simple tasks through a series of chain reactions.
Video captured the moment LOFTID deployed the HIAD (on the left), compared to a preflight animation developed by NASA Langley’s Advanced Concepts Lab (on the right). Inflation happens at the bottom of the video as LOFTID flies over the African continent.
NASA
As it flew over the Mediterranean Sea, LOFTID separated from the ULA Centaur upper stage. On the left, LOFTID is seen from Centaur’s forward-facing camera. The composite image on the right is from cameras around LOFTID’s center body, looking forward and outboard at the orange inflatable HIAD structure. In the center, looking back at Centaur, LOFTID is seen from an aft-facing camera.
NASA
As LOFTID reentered Earth’s atmosphere and reached nearly 2,700 degrees Fahrenheit, the extreme heat caused gases around it to ionize and form plasma. On the right, the images from the center body cameras became extremely bright in the visible spectrum, while the Earth is visible on infrared cameras as the vehicle rotated.
The camera captured footage of the plasma quickly changing colors from orange to purple. Why the color change? “We’re still investigating exactly what causes that,” said John DiNonno, LOFTID chief engineer. The animation on the left shows an artist’s concept of what the front side may have looked like.
NASA
This video, captured by NASA Langley’s Scientifically Calibrated In-Flight Imagery team, shows LOFTID during peak deceleration as the plasma recedes. On the left, LOFTID streaks through the night sky over the Pacific Ocean. On the right, the purple coloration flares up on the back side of LOFTID.
In the second part of the video, the left shifts to one of the cameras looking at the back of the aeroshell, with the receding plasma streaking at its edge.
NASA
After slowing down from more than 18,000 mph to less than 80 mph, LOFTID deployed its parachutes.
From an infrared camera aboard the recovery ship, this video shows the parachute deployment and splashdown just over the horizon. The preflight animation is provided on the right for comparison.
NASA
LOFTID splashed down in the Pacific Ocean several hundred miles off the east coast of Hawaii and only about eight miles from the recovery ship’s bow — almost exactly as modeled. A crew got on a small boat and retrieved and hoisted LOFTID onto the recovery ship. Here is an image from the first contact with LOFTID after it splashed down.
“The LOFTID mission was important because it proved the cutting-edge HIAD design functioned successfully at an appropriate scale and in a relevant environment,” said Tawnya Laughinghouse, manager of the TDM program office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
The LOFTID demonstration was a public private-partnership with ULA funded by STMD and managed by the Technology Demonstration Mission Program, executed by NASA Langley with contributions from across NASA centers. Multiple U.S. small businesses contributed to the hardware. NASA’s Launch Services Program was responsible for NASA’s oversight of launch operations.
