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These images capture the movement and collisions of “cosmic rays”—mysterious particles originating somewhere in deep space—as they stream through the STAR detector at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). The results are profoundly beautiful. The rays, made mostly from the result of supernovae explosions and reaching us at nearly the speed of light, are not just things of beauty. Physicists conducting research at RHIC—a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science user facility for nuclear physics research at Brookhaven National Laboratory—use their signals as a tool for calibrating the massive detectors collecting data for the collider’s physics experiments....

Mission teams stood down from a February 27 launch attempt to review an unusual data signature related to confirming a proper bleed in of pad supplied fluid known as triethylaluminum triethylboron (TEA-TEB). TEA-TEB is an ignition fluid used to start the Falcon 9’s nine first stage kerosene/liquid oxygen Merlin engines. The bleed-in process ensures there is an adequate supply of this fluid at each engine to mix with liquid oxygen to start the engines....

Work has begun on an ambitious new mission that will carry a cutting-edge 8.4-foot (2.5-meter) telescope high into the stratosphere on a balloon. Tentatively planned to launch in December 2023 from Antarctica, ASTHROS (short for Astrophysics Stratospheric Telescope for High Spectral Resolution Observations at Submillimeter-wavelengths) will spend about three weeks drifting on air currents above the icy southern continent and achieve several firsts along the way. Managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, ASTHROS observes far-infrared light, or light with wavelengths much longer than what is visible to the human eye....

Building off the assessment conducted shortly after launch, the preliminary post-flight data indicates that all SLS systems performed exceptionally and that the designs are ready to support a crewed flight on Artemis II. The post-flight analysis team will continue reviewing data and conducting final reports. “NASA’s Space Launch System rocket has laid the foundation for the Artemis Generation and the future of spaceflight in deep space,” said John Honeycutt, SLS Program manager....

Although Cassini will have no further close, targeted flybys of Titan, the spacecraft continues to observe the giant moon and its atmosphere from a distance. The dark regions at top are Titan’s hydrocarbon lakes and seas. See PIA21610 for another view of these clouds. The view is an orthographic projection centered on 57 degrees north latitude, 48 degrees west longitude. An orthographic view is most like the view seen by a distant observer....

-President Donald Trump In December 2017, President Donald J. Trump gave NASA a new direction, telling the agency to work with international and commercial partners to refocus exploration efforts on the moon, with an eye to eventually going on to Mars and even beyond. As stated in Space Policy Directive-1, “The NASA Administrator shall, ‘Lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system and to bring back to Earth new knowledge and opportunities....

Data from SAGE II helped confirm human-driven changes to the ozone layer, which contributed to the 1987 Montreal Protocol that banned some of the most destructive industrially-produced ozone-depleting chemicals. Stratospheric ozone acts as a sunscreen for the Earth, filtering out harmful solar radiation by absorbing some of the Sun’s ultraviolet rays, providing people, animals and plants some protection from that harmful radiation. Credit: Allison McMahon (SSAI): Producer; Haley Reed (ADNET): Producer; David Flittner (NASA/LaRC): Scientist; Marilee Roell (NASA/LaRC): Scientist; Jamie Nehrir (NASA/LaRC): Engineer; Kevin Leavor (SSAI): Scientist; NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab; and NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio(SVS) This latest SAGE III instrument is helping scientists monitor the recovery of ozone resulting from the reduction in emissions of ozone-depleting substances called for under the Montreal Protocol....

Launched into a solar orbit on August 25, 2003, Spitzer was the final of NASA’s four Great Observatories to reach space. The space telescope has illuminated some of the oldest galaxies in the universe, revealed a new ring around Saturn, and peered through shrouds of dust to study newborn stars and black holes. Spitzer assisted in the discovery of planets beyond our solar system, including the detection of seven Earth-size planets orbiting the star TRAPPIST-1, among other accomplishments....

California is experiencing major, sustained wildfires across much of the state along with a heat wave that has produced what has been called a “heat dome” over much of the state. National Interagency Fire Meteorologist Nicky Nausler tweeted on August 18: “7000+ lightning strikes have ignited 350+ fires including several large fires and complexes across central and northern California.” These storms produced more than 53,262 lightning strikes, although all were not cloud-to-ground and some were over the Pacific, according to the U....

Subsurface bodies of water in our outer solar system are some of the most important targets in the search for life beyond Earth. That’s why NASA is sending the Europa Clipper spacecraft to Jupiter’s moon Europa: There is strong evidence that under a thick crust of ice, the moon harbors a global ocean that could potentially be habitable. However, scientists think the ocean isn’t the only water on Europa. Based on observations from NASA’s Galileo orbiter, they believe the moon’s icy shell could contain salty liquid reservoirs – some of them close to the surface of the ice and some many miles below....

Snow is a vital source of water for drinking, agriculture, and electrical power in the western United States and other locations around the world. To know how much water will be available the following spring, water resource managers and hydrologists need to know where snow has fallen, how much there is and how is characteristics change as it melts. Measuring snow water equivalent, or SWE, tells them how much water is contained within the snowpack....

This design could give the capsule the stability and control of a helicopter, but it wouldn’t be powered. The wind passing over the rotors as the capsule descends would make the blades turn, which is known as auto-rotation and it has been proven repeatedly on helicopters, but has yet to be tried on spacecraft. The purpose of this test is to study how the rotor starts to spin, states Jeff Hagen, an engineer at Johnson Space Center in Houston....

DART is targeted to launch at 10:20 p.m. PST, November 23, 2021, (1:20 a.m. EST, November 24), aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Live coverage of the launch will air on NASA TV, the NASA app, and the agency’s website. DART will be the first demonstration of the kinetic impactor technique, which involves sending one or more large, high-speed spacecraft into the path of an asteroid in space to change its motion....

NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, will broadcast a live program about this year’s Perseid meteor shower from 10 p.m. EDT Wednesday, August 12 to 2 a.m. Thursday, August 13. The event will highlight the science behind the Perseids, as well as NASA research related to meteors and comets. The program will air on NASA TV and NASA’s UStream channel. The Perseids have been observed for at least 2,000 years and are associated with the comet Swift-Tuttle, which orbits the sun once every 133 years....

Since 2007 the probe has been traveling through the outermost layer of the heliosphere — the vast bubble around the Sun and the planets dominated by solar material and magnetic fields. Voyager scientists have been watching for the spacecraft to reach the outer boundary of the heliosphere, known as the heliopause. Once Voyager 2 exits the heliosphere, it will become the second human-made object, after Voyager 1, to enter interstellar space....

The astronomers announced their findings at the January 10th meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Long Beach, California. Howard Bond of Pennsylvania State University in University Park states that they believe that this star is the oldest known in the universe with a well-determined age. HD 140283 lies only 186 light years from our Solar System and has been studied for more than a century by astronomers. Researchers have long known that the star consists almost entirely of hydrogen and helium, indicating that it was formed in the early history of the universe....

A team of neuroscientists has identified a potential means to address the loss of cognitive function due to Alzheimer’s disease by targeting protein synthesis in mice. Their findings, reported in the journal Science Signaling, reveal that synthetic pharmaceuticals could rescue the activity of brain cells needed for memory formation. “This work is the first to show that reversing impaired protein synthesis in brains afflicted by Alzheimer’s disease through a pharmacological approach is not only feasible, but also effective,” explains Mauricio Martins-Oliveira, a postdoctoral researcher at New York University’s Center for Neural Science and the paper’s lead author....

Scientists have developed an all-season smart-roof coating that keeps homes warm during the winter and cool during the summer without consuming natural gas or electricity. Research findings reported in the journal Science point to a groundbreaking technology that outperforms commercial cool-roof systems in energy savings. “Our all-season roof coating automatically switches from keeping you cool to warm, depending on outdoor air temperature. This is energy-free, emission-free air conditioning and heating, all in one device,” said Junqiao Wu, a faculty scientist in Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division and a UC Berkeley professor of materials science and engineering who led the study....

Overly excited nerve cells cause problems like epilepsy and tinnitus. A new drug that selectively affects potassium channels promises relief with fewer side effects. A new drug may treat epilepsy and prevent tinnitus by selectively affecting potassium channels in the brain, UConn neurophysiologist Anastasios Tzingounis and colleagues report in the June 10 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience. Epilepsy and tinnitus are both caused by overly excitable nerve cells. Healthy nerves have a built-in system that slams on the brakes when they get too excited....

A new gene therapy has the ability to fix a defective sense of smell in mice by repairing problems with the cilia on their olfactory neurons. This study suggests that abnormalities in cilia can be treated, but it remains unclear how these findings can be applied to other organs. The researchers published their findings in the journal Nature Medicine. Cilia can be found on the surface of many cells, and they affect functions like sensory perception, movement and cell signaling....