Project News

The Light and Dark Sides of NEO Surveyor’s Instrument Enclosure

Near-Earth Object Surveyor • Project News • September 4th, 2025

After arriving at the Space Dynamics Laboratory (SDL) in Logan, Utah, from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California in May 2025, the instrument enclosure for the agency's Near-Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor mission was inspected prior to thermal vacuum testing.

ZTF catches a never-before-seen flare of a supernova

ZTF • News Release • September 4th, 2025

A large team of astronomers, led by ZTF partners at the Northwestern university stumbled upon a unique explosion of a supernova from a massive star back in Sept 2021. After extensive analysis of the supernova using data from multiple telescopes around the world, the astronomers...

20 years of high school teachers and students doing astronomy research at IPAC

NASA/IPAC Teacher Archive Research Program • Project News • August 28th, 2025

The NASA/IPAC Teacher Archive Research Program (NITARP) is celebrating 20 years of high school teachers and students doing astronomy research at IPAC.

SPHEREx Discovers Extended Carbon Dioxide Coma in Interstellar Object 3I-ATLAS

SPHEREx • News Release • August 21st, 2025

SPHEREx has made detailed multi-spectral observations of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS, detecting an abundance of carbon dioxide gas in its coma (the extended gaseous atmosphere of a comet) and water ice in its nucleus. The observations were made between Aug. 7 to Aug. 15, when the object was about...

NASA Roman Core Survey Will Trace Cosmic Expansion Over Time

Roman • News • August 12th, 2025

Roman’s High-Latitude Time-Domain Survey will find exploding stars that act as signposts to measure the universe’s expansion and the influence of dark energy. For thousands of years, humanity viewed the skies as unchanging, except for a few “wandering stars” (that we now know are planets). As we...

NASA’s Lunar Trailblazer Moon Mission Ends

Lunar Trailblazer • Project News • August 4th, 2025

NASA’s Lunar Trailblazer ended its mission to the Moon on July 31. Despite extensive efforts, mission operators were unable to establish two-way communications after losing contact with the spacecraft the day following its Feb. 26 launch.

Betelgeuse’s Companion Star May Have Been Seen at Last

NN-explore Exoplanet Investigations with Doppler spectroscopy • Project News • July 24th, 2025

Three IPAC scientists, David R. Ciardi, Catherine A. Clark, and Elise Furlan, were co-authors on this study supporting the claim that Betelgeuse may have a stellar companion after centuries of hypothesizing.

ENSCI User Survey 2025

Euclid • News Release • July 16th, 2025

ENSCI conducted a user survey in 2025. It collected useful feedback and valuable input from the community. Read about the details!

ZTF catches an interstellar visitor

ZTF • News Release • July 11th, 2025

ENSCI User Panel 2025 report released

Euclid • News Release • July 10th, 2025

ENSCI User panel just released its 2025 report, in which they emphasized ENSCI's critical role in enabling US-based Euclid science investigations, and gave high marks for ENSCI work in the past year.