2015 Year in Review
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
National Aeronautics and Space Administration Volume 12 Issue 1 January 2016 2015 Year in Review www.nasa.gov GoddardView Trending – 2 Celebrating Hubble’s 25 Years of Endless Discoveries – 3 Journey to Mars Is More Than Just Fiction – 4 On Earth Day, Rock Stars and Earth Science Share Center Stage – 5 Goddard’s 2015 Milestones NASA Observes Annual at a Glance – 6 Day of Remembrance The Day of Remembrance honors Open Houses Provide a Closer Look members of the NASA family who gave Into NASA’s Work – 8 their lives in the name of exploration. A Scientifically Enlightening Year This year marks the 30th anniversary of in Heliophysics – 10 the Challenger disaster, which claimed Half a Century Later, Rick Obenschain the lives of all seven crew members. Completes His Final NASA Mission – 11 Goddard Honors Sen. Mikulski and Her U.S. Senator From Florida Astronomical Contributions – 12 Tours Goddard’s Facilities Sen. Bill Nelson toured the center’s facilities on Jan. 16. In 1986, as a On the cover: Select Goddard milestones member of the U.S. House of Rep- and accomplishments from 2015. resentatives, Nelson served as a payload specialist during a mission Cover credit: NASA/Goddard/John W. aboard the space shuttle Columbia. Jones NP-2016-1-385-GSFC 2015 Is Warmest Year on Record Independent analyses by the Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the Na- Info tional Oceanic and Atmospheric Admin- istration concluded that Earth’s globally Goddard View is an official publication of averaged surface temperatures in 2015 NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in were the warmest since modern record- Greenbelt, Maryland. Goddard View showcas- keeping began in 1880. es people and achievements in the Goddard community that support the center’s mission to explore, discover and understand our dynamic GPM Releases Anime Comic Book universe. Goddard View is published by the The Global Precipitation Measure- Goddard Office of Communications. ment mission has released a Japa- nese anime comic book to encourage You may submit story ideas to the editor at young students to read more about [email protected]. All contributions science. The comic’s lead characters are subject to editing and will be published as were selected from more than 40 space allows. entries in a 2013 competition. C E L E B R A T I N G H U B B L E ’ S 25 YEARS OF ENDLESS DISCOVERIES By Murray Hannon sk almost anyone at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight the 2015 John Bahcall Lecture, named in honor of the Center, and they can likely tell you how they’ve sup- astrophysicist for his many contributions to Hubble. Kirsh- ported the Hubble Space Telescope since its launch ner described how his team has used Hubble to observe Aon April 24, 1990. During its time in orbit, Hubble has be- supernovas exploding billions of light-years away. come an international icon of science that has uncovered some of the universe’s most compelling mysteries, and its In July, Goddard hosted a day of talks in which those who home base for operations is right here at Goddard. have supported the mission over the years shared their stories, challenges and hopes for the telescope in the Thanks to Hubble, scientists have determined the age of years to come. John Mather, senior project scientist for the universe with greater accuracy than ever before. They the Webb telescope, also discussed the expectations for learned the speed at which the universe is expanding, and Webb as Hubble’s successor. NASA Administrator Charles that this expansion is also accelerating. They gathered Bolden closed the event by recalling his days as an astro- new information on the birth of planets. They now know naut aboard STS-31, which used the space shuttle Discov- that supermassive black holes likely exist in all galaxies. ery to deploy Hubble in 1990. “Hubble’s legacy will forever be based on its incredible On Sept. 26, more than 20,000 came for the Explore@ number of discoveries,” said Jim Jeletic, Hubble deputy NASAGoddard open house, which highlighted the theme project manager. “To date, Hubble data have been used to “Celebrating Hubble and the Spirit of Exploration.” produce more peer-reviewed scientific papers than from any other NASA mission. From that perspective, Hubble After a quarter-century of countless achievements, and has been the most productive mission in history.” celebrations to boot, Hubble is expected to continue pro- ducing breathtaking images and making discoveries in the To celebrate Hubble’s 25 years of inspiration and wonder, coming years. “We are using the telescope to the fullest Goddard dedicated several events in 2015 to the tele- extent and hope that the telescope will operate at least un- scope and the people behind its success. til 2020 and probably many years beyond that,” said Jen- nifer Wiseman, NASA’s senior project scientist for Hubble. The festivities began on April 23, one day prior to the launch anniversary, as social media users gathered for a As Goddard looks back on Hubble’s success and moves NASA Social – a program that allows the agency’s social forward with new endeavors, the telescope continues to media followers to learn and share information about its inspire the scientific community and the public by reveal- work and people. Attendees began the day at the News- ing the staggering potential that exists within the universe. eum in Washington, D.C., where they met with scientists, engineers and astronauts who were involved with Hubble “Hubble will go down as a story of inspiration that has and its repair missions. NASA also unveiled “Celestial mesmerized people around the world,” added Jeletic. Fireworks” – which features young stars flaring to life – as “Hubble has fulfilled that original promise of discovery and the commemorative image of the anniversary. During a exceeded everyone’s expectations.” n visit to Goddard, guests toured the facilities where Hubble was largely built and tested, the James Webb Space Tele- Above: NASA scientists, engineers and astronauts discuss scope clean room, and the Hubble control center. the Hubble Space Telescope during a 25th anniversary celebratory event at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. On April 24, Robert Kirshner – science professor at Har- vard University – addressed Goddard as the speaker for Photo credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani Volume 12 Issue 1 • January 2016 3 JOURNEY TO MARS IS MORE THAN JUST FICTION By Jenny Hottle hile astronaut Mark Watney was planning his es- While MAVEN examines the Martian air, NASA’s rovers on cape from Mars in the 2015 science fiction film “The the ground are studying the planet’s geology and minerals Martian,” NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center was that possibly formed in the presence of water. NASA’s Curios- Whard at work helping develop the capabilities needed to send ity rover conducted experiments to study changes in Martian real-life astronauts to Earth’s neighbor. And when the New environmental conditions. Curiosity’s Sample Analysis at Mars Horizons spacecraft completed its historic flyby of Pluto in instrument suite, which Goddard developed, detected the July, scientists took it as an informative moment for NASA’s release of nitrogen from the surface during the heating of plan- overarching goal of developing a long-awaited expedition to etary sediments. The discovery, announced in March, further the Red Planet by the 2030s. suggests that Mars was once capable of supporting life. In the past year alone, as part of the agencywide Journey Goddard’s contributions extend far beyond planetary research. to Mars endeavor, Goddard’s brightest minds made ground- The center is also developing the technologies and instru- breaking discoveries about how the planet evolved from being ments that will help make the journey possible. Several proj- warm, wet and potentially habitable billions of years ago to ects were discussed during a panel event in October. becoming a dry and cold environment today. In addition, the center’s scientists and researchers have been studying how David Israel, an architect for exploration and space communi- to get astronauts to Mars and survive cations, spoke about a communica- the planet’s harsh environment, how tions network that will allow Mars- communications systems between bound astronauts to communicate Earth and Mars could work, and what with Earth. He also outlined God- kind of scientific research Mars- dard’s GPS-Enhanced Onboard bound astronauts will undertake and Navigation System, which allows what technologies they’ll use. spacecraft to process GPS data in order to self-navigate. “I’ve been waiting my whole life to get the opportunity to participate at Engineer Mark Lupisella discussed NASA and make sure we’re clear the development of low-latency and focused on the journey to Mars,” teleoperations that facilitate the said Dava Newman, NASA’s recently exploration of Mars without land- appointed deputy administrator, dur- ing on or contaminating its surface. ing her visit to Goddard in August. One such project could enable “We’re on a journey to Mars. It’s not astronauts to control rovers on the theoretical.” surface while orbiting the planet. To help play its part, Goddard has managed the Mars Atmo- Planetary geologist Jake Bleacher and his team have been sphere and Volatile Evolution mission since it launched in working on and testing instruments on orbiters that astronauts November 2013. The mission recently hit several major mile- will potentially use on the surface. They are also conduct- stones as it continues to study the planet’s upper atmosphere. ing habitability tests to determine how long humans can In April, MAVEN completed 1,000 orbits around Mars. By the live in a rover, similar to how Watney survived in a fictional time it celebrated one year on the planet in September, the Ares III vehicle.