Goddard Space Flight Center

Observing across the starry “plains” of space, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has taken new images of NGC 2392, nicknamed the Lion Nebula. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope previously viewed this planetary nebula in 2000, imaging the lion face-shaped target in visible light and revealing features such as the “mane” of hazy, comet-shaped objects.

Posted August 10, 2026

Commercial Space

Benefits to Science

Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS)

Goddard Space Flight Center

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO)

Lunar Science

Missions

Science Mission Directorate

NASA Will Attempt to Observe Rocket Part’s Lunar Impact

Using ground-based telescopes and space-based assets, NASA and SpaceX are tracking a used Falcon 9 upper stage from a commercial mission expected to impact the Moon on Wednesday, Aug. 5, near the Einstein and Bell craters. The impact poses no danger to Earth and NASA scientists are planning to collect lunar data from the event […]

Posted August 4, 2026

Coronagraph

Coronal Mass Ejections

Goddard Space Flight Center

Heliophysics

Heliophysics Division

Missions

Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere (PUNCH)

The Sun

NASA’s PUNCH Sharpens Solar Storm Forecasting in First Test

Using continuous imagery from NASA’s PUNCH (Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere) mission, scientists predicted the near-Earth arrival of a solar eruption to within 30 minutes in an initial proof of concept test.

Posted August 4, 2026

Scientific Balloons

Goddard Space Flight Center

Wallops Flight Facility

Louisiana Students Loft Payloads from NASA Balloon Facility in Texas

Every spring in Palestine, Texas, the wide-open fields around NASA’s Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility fill with students and faculty from across Louisiana. They arrive carrying sensors, laptops, and carefully engineered payloads they have spent months preparing.

Posted August 3, 2026

Communicating and Navigating with Missions

Artemis

Commercial Space

Goddard Space Flight Center

Moon Base

Research and Technology Mission Directorate

Space Communications & Navigation Program

NASA Delivers Navigation System for Commercial Lunar Relay

NASA delivered the NavCube3-mini payload on July 13 to Intuitive Machines for integration into Altus-1, the company’s first lunar relay satellite, marking an important milestone in the development of future lunar communications and navigation services. The lunar relays are designed to enable communications and navigation for astronauts and rovers o

Posted August 3, 2026

Astrophysics

Exoplanets

Goddard Space Flight Center

Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Kennedy Space Center

Launch Services Office

Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope

NASA’s Roman Telescope to Carry 1.35 Million Names to Deep Space

On July 27, technicians at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida installed a memory card containing 1,350,144 names as part of a commemorative plaque on the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. The names were submitted by people globally, including astronauts from Artemis II and Artemis III. The memory card will travel with the Roman observatory […]

Posted July 31, 2026

Airborne Science

Earth

Earth's Atmosphere

Goddard Space Flight Center

Oceans

Students Take on Airborne Field Research with NASA

The gusty wind didn’t make it easy to hold tight to a balloon so large. The balloon, a scientific instrument called an ozonesonde, was about to be released into the atmosphere above the Texas Gulf Coast by students from NASA’s SARP (Student Airborne Research Program), which concluded its summer session July 27. The balloon’s job […]

Posted July 30, 2026

Astrophysics

Galaxies

Goddard Space Flight Center

Hubble Space Telescope

James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)

Science & Research

The Universe

NASA Webb Explores Family Tree of Newly Discovered Distant Objects

Since their discovery by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope in 2022, little red dots (LRDs) have been the subject of great interest to astronomers. Understanding the nature of these extremely distant, compact red sources has been a puzzling scientific endeavor.

Posted July 29, 2026

Aqua

Earth Observatory

Goddard Space Flight Center

PACE (Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, Ocean Ecosystem)

Terra

Water Blooms

Sizing Up the Sargassum Belt

Seaweed composing the Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt hit near-record levels in June 2026, with the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of America both reaching all-time highs.

Posted July 29, 2026

Eclipses

Goddard Space Flight Center

Heliophysics

Johnson Space Center

Langley Research Center

Scientific Balloons

Skywatching

Solar Eclipses

The Sun

WB-57

NASA Science Soars During August Total Solar Eclipse

Each time the Moon covers the Sun during a total solar eclipse — darkening daytime skies and briefly revealing the Sun’s ethereal outer atmosphere, the corona — it presents new opportunities to better understand our star and its influence on Earth. On Wednesday, Aug. 12, as the next total solar eclipse sweeps over Greenland, Iceland, […]

Posted July 27, 2026