This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image reveals new details in Messier 82 (M82), home to brilliant stars whose light is shaded by sculptural clouds made of clumps and streaks of dust and gas. This image features the star-powered heart of the galaxy, located just 12 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major (the Great Bear). Popularly known as the Cigar Galaxy, M82 is considered a nearby galaxy.

It’s no surprise that M82 is packed with stars. The galaxy forms stars 10 times faster than the Milky Way. Astronomers call it a starburst galaxy. The intense starbirth period that grips this galaxy gave rise to super star clusters in the galaxy’s heart. Each of these super star clusters holds hundreds of thousands of stars and is more luminous than a typical star cluster. Researchers used Hubble to home in on these massive clusters and reveal how they form and evolve.

Hubble’s previous views of the galaxy captured ultraviolet and visible light in 2012 and near-infrared and visible light in 2006 to celebrate Hubble’s 16th anniversary. NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and Spitzer Space Telescope also imaged this starburst galaxy. Combining the visible and near-infrared light Hubble data with Chandra’s x-ray and Spitzer’s deeper infrared view provides a detailed look at the galaxy’s stars, along with the dust and gas from which stars form. More recently the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope turned its eye toward the galaxy, producing infrared images in 2024 and earlier this year. These multiple views at different wavelengths of light provide us with a more accurate and complete picture of this galaxy so that we can better understand its environment. Each of these NASA observatories delivers unique and complementary information about the galaxy’s physical processes. Combining their data yields insights that enhance our understanding in a way that no single observatory could accomplish alone. This image features something not seen in previously released Hubble images of the galaxy:  data from the High Resolution Channel of the Advanced Camera for Surveys.

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Media Contact:

Claire Andreoli (claire.andreoli@nasa.gov)
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD

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Of the many roads leading to successful Artemis missions, one is paved with high-tech computing chips called superchips. Along the way, a partnership between NASA wind tunnel engineers, data visualization scientists, and software developers verified a quick, cost-effective solution to improve NASA’s SLS (Space Launch System) rocket for the upcoming Artemis II mission. This will be the first crewed flight of the SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft, on an approximately 10-day journey around the Moon.  

A high-speed network connection between high-end computing resources at the NASA Advanced Supercomputing facility and the Unitary Plan Wind Tunnel, both located at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley, is enabling a collaboration to improve the rocket for the Artemis II mission. During the Artemis I test flight, the SLS rocket experienced higher-than-expected vibrations near the solid rocket booster attach points, caused by unsteady airflow between the gap.

One solution proposed for Artemis II was adding four strakes. A strake is a thin, fin-like structure commonly used on aircraft to improve unsteady airflow and stability. Adding them to the core stage minimizes the vibration of components.

The strake solution comes from previous tests in the Unitary Plan Wind Tunnel, where NASA engineers applied an Unsteady Pressure Sensitive Paint (uPSP) technique to SLS models. The paint measures changes over time in aerodynamic pressures on air and spacecraft.

It is sprayed onto test models, and high-speed cameras capture video of the fluctuating brightness of the paint, which corresponds to the local pressure fluctuations on the model. Capturing rapid changes in pressure across large areas of the SLS model helps engineers understand the fast-changing environment. The data is streamed to the NASA Advanced Supercomputing facility via a high-speed network connection.

“This technique lets us see wind tunnel data in much finer detail than ever before. With that extra clarity, engineers can create more accurate models of how rockets and spacecraft respond to stress, helping design stronger, safer, and more efficient structures,” said Thomas Steva, lead engineer, SLS sub-division in the Aerodynamics Branch at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.

For the SLS configuration with the strakes, the wind tunnel team applied the paint to a scale model of the rocket. Once the camera data streamed to the supercomputing facility, a team of visualization and data analysis experts displayed the results on the hyperwall visualization system, giving the SLS team an unprecedented look at the effect of the strakes on the vehicle’s performance. Teams were able to interact with and analyze the paint data.

NASA’s high-end computing capability and facilities, paired with unique facilities at Ames, give us the ability to increase productivity by shortening timelines, reducing costs, and strengthening designs in ways that directly support safe human spaceflight.

Kevin Murphy

NASA’s Chief Science Data Officer

“NASA’s high-end computing capability and facilities, paired with unique facilities at Ames, give us the ability to increase productivity by shortening timelines, reducing costs, and strengthening designs in ways that directly support safe human spaceflight,” said Kevin Murphy, NASA’s chief science data officer and lead for the agency’s High-End Computing Capability portfolio at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “We’re actively using this capability to help ensure Artemis II is ready for launch.”

Leveraging the high-speed connection between the Unitary Plan Wind Tunnel and NASA Advanced Supercomputing facility reduces the typical data processing time from weeks to just hours.

For years, the NASA Advancing Supercomputing Division’s in-house Launch, Ascent, and Vehicle Aerodynamics software has helped play a role in designing and certifying the various SLS vehicle configurations.

“Being able to work with the hyperwall and the visualization team allows for in-person, rapid engagement with data, and we can make near-real-time tweaks to the processing,” said Lara Lash, an aerospace engineering researcher in the Experimental Aero-Physics Branch at NASA Ames who leads the uPSP work.

This time, NASA Advanced Supercomputing researchers used the Cabeus supercomputer, which is the agency’s largest GPU-based computing cluster containing 350 NVIDIA superchip nodes. The supercomputer produced a series of complex computational fluid dynamic simulations that helped explain the underlying physics of the strake addition and filled in gaps between areas where the wind tunnel cameras and sensors couldn’t reach.

This truly was a joint effort across multiple teams.

“The beauty of the strake solution is that we were able to add strakes to improve unsteady aerodynamics, and associated vibration levels of components in the intertank,” said Kristin Morgan, who manages the strake implementation effort for the SLS at Marshall.

A team from Boeing is currently installing the strakes on the rocket at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida and are targeting October 2025 to complete installation.

Through Artemis, NASA will send astronauts to explore the Moon for scientific discovery, economic benefits, and build the foundation for the first crewed missions to Mars.

To learn more about Artemis, visit:

https://www.nasa.gov/artemis

News Media Contact

Jonathan Deal
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. 
256.544.0034
jonathan.e.deal@nasa.gov

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The project has exceeded all of its technical goals after two years, setting up the foundations of high-speed communications for NASA’s future human missions to Mars.

NASA’s Deep Space Optical Communications technology successfully showed that data encoded in lasers could be reliably transmitted, received, and decoded after traveling millions of miles from Earth at distances comparable to Mars. Nearly two years after launching aboard the agency’s Psyche mission in 2023, the technology demonstration recently completed its 65th and final pass, sending a laser signal to Psyche and receiving the return signal, from 218 million miles away. 

“NASA is setting America on the path to Mars, and advancing laser communications technologies brings us one step closer to streaming high-definition video and delivering valuable data from the Martian surface faster than ever before,” said acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy. “Technology unlocks discovery, and we are committed to testing and proving the capabilities needed to enable the Golden Age of exploration.”

Record-breaking technology

Just a month after launch, the Deep Space Optical Communications demonstration proved it could send a signal back to Earth it established a link with the optical terminal aboard the Psyche spacecraft.

“NASA Technology tests hardware in the harsh environment of space to understand its limits and prove its capabilities,” said Clayton Turner, associate administrator, Space Technology Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Over two years, this technology surpassed our expectations, demonstrating data rates comparable to those of household broadband internet and sending engineering and test data to Earth from record-breaking distances.”

On Dec. 11, 2023, the demonstration achieved a historic first by streaming an ultra-high-definition video to Earth from over 19 million miles away (about 80 times the distance between Earth and the Moon), at the system’s maximum bitrate of 267 megabits per second. The project also surpassed optical communications distance records on Dec. 3, 2024, when it downlinked Psyche data from 307 million miles away (farther than the average distance between Earth and Mars). In total, the experiment’s ground terminals received 13.6 terabits of data from Psyche.

How it works

Managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California, the experiment consists of a flight laser transceiver mounted on the Psyche spacecraft, along with two ground stations to receive and send data from Earth. A powerful 3-kilowatt uplink laser at JPL’s Table Mountain Facility transmitted a laser beacon to Psyche, helping the transceiver determine where to aim the optical communications laser back to Earth.

Both Psyche and Earth are moving through space at tremendous speeds, and they are so distant from each other that the laser signal — which travels at the speed of light — can take several minutes to reach its destination. By using the precise pointing required from the ground and flight laser transmitters to close the communication link, teams at NASA proved that optical communications can be done to support future missions throughout the solar system.

Another element of the experiment included detecting and decoding a faint signal after the laser traveled millions of miles. The project enlisted a 200-inch telescope at Caltech’s Palomar Observatory in San Diego County as its primary downlink station, which provided enough light-collecting area to collect the faintest photons. Those photons were then directed to a high-efficiency detector array at the observatory, where the information encoded in the photons could be processed.   

“We faced many challenges, from weather events that shuttered our ground stations to wildfires in Southern California that impacted our team members,” said Abi Biswas, Deep Space Optical Communications project technologist and supervisor at JPL. “But we persevered, and I am proud that our team embraced the weekly routine of optically transmitting and receiving data from Psyche. We constantly improved performance and added capabilities to get used to this novel kind of deep space communication, stretching the technology to its limits.”

Brilliant new era

In another test, data was downlinked to an experimental radio frequency-optical “hybrid” antenna at the Deep Space Network’s Goldstone complex near Barstow, California. The antenna was retrofitted with an array of seven mirrors, totaling 3 feet in diameter, enabling the antenna to receive radio frequency and optical signals from Psyche simultaneously.

The project also used Caltech’s Palomar Observatory and a smaller 1-meter telescope at Table Mountain to receive the same signal from Psyche. Known as “arraying,” this is commonly done with radio antennas to better receive weak signals and build redundancy into the system.

“As space exploration continues to evolve, so do our data transfer needs,” said Kevin Coggins, deputy associate administrator, NASA’s SCaN (Space Communications and Navigation) program at the agency’s headquarters. “Future space missions will require astronauts to send high-resolution images and instrument data from the Moon and Mars back to Earth. Bolstering our capabilities of traditional radio frequency communications with the power and benefits of optical communications will allow NASA to meet these new requirements.”

This demonstration is the latest in a series of optical communication experiments funded by the Space Technology Mission Directorate’s Technology Demonstration Missions Program managed at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, and the agency’s SCaN program within the Space Operations Mission Directorate. The Psyche mission is led by Arizona State University. Lindy Elkins-Tanton of the University of California, Berkeley is the principal investigator. NASA JPL, managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California, is responsible for the mission’s overall management.

To learn more about the laser communications demo, visit:

https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/deep-space-optical-communications-dsoc/

News Media Contact

Ian J. O’Neill
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-2649
ian.j.oneill@jpl.nasa.gov

2025-120

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The commercial aviation industry is a crucial component of the U.S. economy, playing a vital role in transporting people, intermediate/final goods, and driving demand for various goods and services nationwide. This network enhances the quality of life for the whole country and facilitates business interactions within and globally, boosting productivity and prosperity. However, the industry faces numerous challenges, particularly the need to reduce rising operational costs in a growing market to accommodate increased demand in air travel, e-commerce, and cargo sectors. Issues such as aging aircraft and components, technological advancements, and staffing shortages further complicate these challenges, hindering efforts to balance passenger safety with operational efficiency. To address these challenges, the industry needs to swiftly innovate and implement more efficient and resilient aircraft maintenance practices, including the adoption of new technologies. In the 2026 Gateways to Blue Skies Competition, teams will conceptualize novel aviation maintenance advancements that can be implemented by 2035 or sooner with the goal of improving efficiency, safety, and/or costs for the industry. Teams are encouraged to consider high-potential technologies and systems that aren’t currently mainstream or highly regarded as becoming mainstream in the future, imagining beyond the status quo.

Award: $72,000 in total prizes

Open Date: Phase 1 – September 18, 2025; Phase 2 – March 13, 2026

Close Date: Phase 1 – February 16, 2026; Phase 2- May 15, 2026

For more information, visit: https://blueskies.nianet.org/competition/

A black hole is growing at one of the fastest rates ever recorded, according to a team of astronomers. This discovery from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory may help explain how some black holes can reach enormous masses relatively quickly after the big bang.

The black hole weighs about a billion times the mass of the Sun and is located about 12.8 billion light-years from Earth, meaning that astronomers are seeing it only 920 million years after the universe began. It is producing more X-rays than any other black hole seen in the first billion years of the universe.

The black hole is powering what scientists call a quasar, an extremely bright object that outshines entire galaxies. The power source of this glowing monster is large amounts of matter funneling around and entering the black hole.

While the same team discovered it two years ago, it took observations from Chandra in 2023 to discover what sets this quasar, RACS J0320-35, apart. The X-ray data reveal that this black hole appears to be growing at a rate that exceeds the normal limit for these objects.

“It was a bit shocking to see this black hole growing by leaps and bounds,” said Luca Ighina of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who led the study.

When matter is pulled toward a black hole it is heated and produces intense radiation over a broad spectrum, including X-rays and optical light. This radiation creates pressure on the infalling material. When the rate of infalling matter reaches a critical value, the radiation pressure balances the black hole’s gravity, and matter cannot normally fall inwards any more rapidly. That maximum is referred to as the Eddington limit.

Scientists think that black holes growing more slowly than the Eddington limit need to be born with masses of about 10,000 Suns or more so they can reach a billion solar masses within a billion years after the big bang — as has been observed in RACS J0320-35. A black hole with such a high birth mass could directly result from an exotic process: the collapse of a huge cloud of dense gas containing unusually low amounts of elements heavier than helium, conditions that may be extremely rare.

If RACS J0320-35 is indeed growing at a high rate — estimated at 2.4 times the Eddington limit — and has done so for a sustained amount of time, its black hole could have started out in a more conventional way, with a mass less than a hundred Suns, caused by the implosion of a massive star.

“By knowing the mass of the black hole and working out how quickly it’s growing, we’re able to work backward to estimate how massive it could have been at birth,” said co-author Alberto Moretti of INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera in Italy. “With this calculation we can now test different ideas on how black holes are born.”

To figure out how fast this black hole is growing (between 300 and 3,000 Suns per year), the researchers compared theoretical models with the X-ray signature, or spectrum, from Chandra, which gives the amounts of X-rays at different energies. They found the Chandra spectrum closely matched what they expected from models of a black hole growing faster than the Eddington limit. Data from optical and infrared light also supports the interpretation that this black hole is packing on weight faster than the Eddington limit allows.

“How did the universe create the first generation of black holes?” said co-author Thomas of Connor, also of the Center for Astrophysics. “This remains one of the biggest questions in astrophysics and this one object is helping us chase down the answer.”

Another scientific mystery addressed by this result concerns the cause of jets of particles that move away from some black holes at close to the speed of light, as seen in RACS J0320-35. Jets like this are rare for quasars, which may mean that the rapid rate of growth of the black hole is somehow contributing to the creation of these jets.

The quasar was previously discovered as part of a radio telescope survey using the Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder, combined with optical data from the Dark Energy Camera, an instrument mounted on the Victor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. The U.S. National Science Foundation National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory’s Gemini-South Telescope on Cerro Pachon, Chile was used to obtain the accurate distance of RACS J0320-35.

A paper describing these results has been accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal and is available here.

NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, manages the Chandra program. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s Chandra X-ray Center controls science operations from Cambridge, and flight operations from Burlington, Massachusetts.

Learn more about the Chandra X-ray Observatory and its mission here:

https://www.nasa.gov/chandra

https://chandra.si.edu

Visual Description

This release features a quasar located 12.8 billion light-years from Earth, presented as an artist’s illustration and an X-ray image from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory.

In the artist’s illustration, the quasar, RACS J0320-35, sits at our upper left, filling the left side of the image. It resembles a spiraling, motion-blurred disk of orange, red, and yellow streaks. At the center of the disk, surrounded by a glowing, sparking, brilliant yellow light, is a black egg shape. This is a black hole, one of the fastest-growing black holes ever detected. The black hole is also shown in a small Chandra X-ray image inset at our upper right. In that depiction, the black hole appears as a white dot with an outer ring of neon purple.

The artist’s illustration also highlights a jet of particles blasting away from the black hole at the center of the quasar. The streaked silver beam starts at the core of the distant quasar, near our upper left, and shoots down toward our lower right. The blurry beam of energetic particles appears to widen as it draws closer and exits the image.

News Media Contact

Megan Watzke
Chandra X-ray Center
Cambridge, Mass.
617-496-7998
mwatzke@cfa.harvard.edu

Corinne Beckinger
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama
256-544-0034
corinne.m.beckinger@nasa.gov

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Building a Lunar Network: Johnson Tests Wireless Technologies for the Moon 

NASA engineers are strapping on backpacks loaded with radios, cameras, and antennas to test technology that might someday keep explorers connected on the lunar surface. Their mission: test how astronauts on the Moon will stay connected during Artemis spacewalks using 3GPP (LTE/4G and 5G) and Wi-Fi technologies. 

It’s exciting to bring lunar spacewalks into the 21st century with the immersive, high-definition experience that will make people feel like they’re right there with the astronauts.

Raymond Wagner

NASA’s Lunar 3GPP Project Principal Investigator

With Artemis, NASA will establish a long-term presence at the Moon, opening more of the lunar surface to exploration than ever before. This growth of lunar activity will require astronauts to communicate seamlessly with each other and with science teams back on Earth.  

“We’re working out what the software that uses these networks needs to look like,” said Raymond Wagner, principal investigator in NASA’s Lunar 3GPP project and member of Johnson Space Center’s Exploration Wireless Laboratory (JEWL) in Houston. “We’re prototyping it with commercial off-the-shelf hardware and open-source software to show what pieces are needed and how they interact.” 

The next big step comes with Artemis III, which will land a crew on the Moon and carry a 4G/LTE demonstration to stream video and audio from the astronauts on the lunar surface. 

 The vision goes further. “Right now the lander or rover will host the network,” Wagner said. “But if we go to the Moon to stay, we may eventually want actual cell towers. The spacesuit itself is already becoming the astronaut’s cell phone, and rovers could act as mobile hotspots. Altogether, these will be the building blocks of communication on the Moon.” 

Back at Johnson, teams are simulating lunar spacewalks, streaming video, audio, and telemetry over a private 5G network to a mock mission control. The work helps engineers refine how future systems will perform in challenging environments. Craters, lunar regolith, and other terrain features all affect how radio signals travel — lessons that will also carry over to Mars. 

For Wagner, the project is about shaping how humanity experiences the next era of exploration. “We’re aiming for true HD on the Moon,” he said. “It’s going to be pretty mind-blowing.” 

About the Author

Sumer Loggins

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