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The latest on the US space agency's crafts, missions, and discoveries—from low-Earth orbit to deep space.

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An illustration of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope in space. It is a long cylindrical telescope with mirrors on the outside

How NASA’s new Nancy Grace Roman space telescope compares with Hubble and Webb

By Meghan Bartels

a white telescope launches aboard a rocket

NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman space telescope launches

By Andrew Paul, Laura Baisas

Artist's concept art of the NASA Gateway lunar spaceport orbiting the moon in the background

How NASA is prepping for lunar traffic jams

A region of space filled with bright stars and clouds of gas. In the centre, the densest clouds form the shape of a chest with its lid open. The chest appears to glow from within. At its base it breaks apart into long pillars of thick gas. Many of the gas clouds in the background are dark orange globules, while others form large, pale hazes. A few brightly shining stars lie in the foreground, the biggest and brightest in front of the chest’s lid.

‘Treasure Chest’ cosmic cloud glitters with dozens of young stars

Artist's illustration of Swift Observatory orbiting Earth in space

NASA abandons mission to save Swift Observatory from a fiery death

Image of SpaceX lunar crater created by upper stage rocket with a red arrow pointing to it

NASA shares first images of SpaceX moon crash site

NASA’s Boeing 777 returns to the agency’s Langley Research Center after receiving a new paint scheme.

NASA’s next flying lab readies for takeoff after new paint job

We just got a glimpse at what NASA’s Skyfall helicopters will look like in action

By Sara Hashemi

Astronomers have discovered a “black hole star,” an extremely bright red spot in the early universe that appears to be a new type of astrophysical object. It resembles an enormous star, but its energy production is closer to what a black hole might generate.

Astronomers discover the existence of a ‘black hole star’

This image features data from Webb’s NIRCam (Near Infrared Camera) and MIRI (Mid Infrared Instrument) to capture the most detailed mid-infrared view yet of the field that hosts the highly evolved star IRS 3, which is located just 0.55 light-years from Sagittarius A*, the Milky Way galaxy's central supermassive black hole. An international team of astronomers have discovered that dust and water can form and survive surprisingly close to this supermassive black hole. The observations reveal that the evolved star IRS 3 continues to enrich its surroundings with newly formed material despite the intense radiation environment around Sagittarius A*. The data in this image were taken with Webb programmes #1939 (J. Lu), #3571 (F. Yusef-Zadeh), #2491 (N. B. Sabha), and #2075 (C. Chan). [Image description: A dense star field fills the entire image, with countless stars scattered across a backdrop of glowing clouds in shades of red, orange, pink, white, and blue. At the centre, a brilliant concentration of stars creates a bright, almost white core surrounded by intricate filaments and wisps of illuminated gas and dust that radiate outward. Dark, irregular patches of opaque dust interrupt the glowing clouds, particularly toward the left side of the image, where they appear as silhouetted shapes against the brighter background. The surrounding stellar population varies in brightness and colour, with cool blue stars and warmer orange and red stars distributed throughout the scene.]

Our galaxy’s supermassive black hole actually doesn’t devour everything

NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft, depicted in this artist’s concept, has enough power to continue operating three science instruments in interstellar space longer than anticipated thanks to some clever engineering by the mission team.

NASA successfully gives Voyager 2 another year of life

Martian butte surrounded by polygonal sediment formations

Curiosity rover spots ancient sea of Martian polygons

This artist's concept depicts a tidal disruption event, which occurs when a star passes fatally close to a supermassive black hole. Crumbs of the splintering star heat up as they swirl around the black hole, creating a glow astronomers can see from far across the cosmos, and the black hole launches a relativistic jet into space.

Super rare black hole devours unlucky star

Screenshot from the time-lapse video shows the approach, close approach, and departure of NASA’s Psyche spacecraft at Mars as it used the planet’s gravity for a boost on its way to the asteroid Psyche.

Mars’ desolate desert landscape captured by asteroid-bound NASA spacecraft

This artist’s concept depicts a near-Earth asteroid with an elongated orbit. A few objects such as these can exhibit significant perturbations in their motion around the Sun and, like the asteroid 1998 SH2, could turn out to be regular comets with a weak tail and coma (the gas and dust around a comet’s nucleus). NASA/JPL-Caltech

Near-Earth asteroid not an asteroid at all

Side by side photo of meteorite impact hole in house roof, and an image of the meteorite fragment

A meteorite crashed into a New Jersey home in 2024. Inside it were life’s building blocks.

A visualization of the supernova Cassiopeia A using data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the James Webb Space Telescope. The cloudy blast-wave of the supernova remnant is ring-like in shape, streaked with veins of iron, calcium, and oxygen. Here, presented in red, white, and blue, the remnant resembles an electrified donut, crackling with marbled veins of strawberry and blueberry icing.

NASA celebrates Fourth of July with some cosmic fireworks

Collage showing a red submersible partly underwater.

Before the moon race, explorers wanted to conquer the ocean

By Bill Gourgey

In the composite image, Messier 83, or M83, is shown to have a spiral structure, viewed straight on. At the center is a brilliant white and yellow pool of light. From that light, spiral arms of hot pink cloud corkscrew out in wide, sweeping arches. The galaxy is covered in a faint grey haze, and flecked with red, green, blue, white, and yellow dots.

‘Fireworks’ spotted in stellar explosion 15 million light-years away

By Laura Baisas

an illustration of a barrel-shaped space telescope flying near purple constellations in space

Put your name aboard NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope

By Laura Baisas