JPL-developed technologies, including VITAL, FINDER, 3D-printing methods, and Voyager spacecraft communications, are featured in the agency’s technology publication.
Published Jan. 31, 2023
To make sure ventilators could be quickly manufactured and administered to those in need during the COVID-19 pandemic, a team of engineers at JPL created the Ventilator Intervention Technology Accessible Locally (VITAL) device, made of off-the-shelf parts. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
When it comes to NASA, most people look to the skies as rockets, rovers, and astronauts push the boundaries of space exploration. But the benefits of going above and beyond can be found here on Earth through products and services born from NASA innovation.
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NASA’s upcoming SPHEREx mission will be able to scan the entire sky every six months and create a map of the cosmos unlike any before.
Scheduled to launch no later than April 2025, it will probe what happened within the first second after the big bang, how galaxies form and evolve, and the prevalence of molecules critical to the formation of life, like water, locked away as ice in our galaxy.
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Achieving these goals will require cutting-edge technology, and NASA has this month approved final plans for all the observatory’s components.
A prize competition is designed to engage underrepresented academic institutions in helping NASA make advancements in machine learning, AI, and developing of autonomous systems.
Through a new prize competition, NASA is engaging minority serving institutions (MSIs) to bring ideas for new information technologies that will help address climate change.
The prize competition, the MSI Space Accelerator, comes from a new partnership between NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, the Minority University Research Education Project within the Office of STEM Engagement, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, and Starburst Accelerator in Los Angeles.
The MSI Space Accelerator competition is designed to engage underrepresented academic institutions and help NASA make significant advancements in the areas of machine learning, artificial intelligence, and the development of autonomous systems. The best ideas will be awarded up to $50,000 in prize funding to each institution.
New JPL director Dr. Laurie Leshin. Worcester Polytechnic Institute
NASA isn’t just interested in putting more women in space.
The agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory has appointed Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s Dr. Laurie Leshin as its first female director.
She’ll assume the role on May 16th, replacing former director Michael Watkins (who retired in August 2021) and interim director Lt. Gen Larry James. She’ll also serve as vice president of Caltech, which manages the JPL.
Leshin has extensive experience, both in science and in breaking new ground. She has held senior positions in NASA, including a key director role at the Goddard Space Flight Center. As deputy associate administrator for NASA’s Exploration Systems Mission Directorate, she laid some of the groundwork for both commercial spaceflight and Artemis. She was Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s science dean, and has served as WPI’s first female president since 2014.
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter captured this shot as it hovered over the Martian surface on April 19, 2021, during the first instance of powered, controlled flight on another planet. It used its navigation camera, which autonomously tracks the ground during flight. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Monday, NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter became the first aircraft in history to make a powered, controlled flight on another planet.
The Ingenuity team at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California confirmed the flight succeeded after receiving data from the helicopter via NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover at 6:46 a.m. EDT (3:46 a.m. PDT).
“Ingenuity is the latest in a long and storied tradition of NASA projects achieving a space exploration goal once thought impossible,” said acting NASA Administrator Steve Jurczyk. “The X-15 was a pathfinder for the space shuttle. Mars Pathfinder and its Sojourner rover did the same for three generations of Mars rovers. We don’t know exactly where Ingenuity will lead us, but today’s results indicate the sky – at least on Mars – may not be the limit.”
In this video captured by NASA’s Perseverance rover, the agency’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter took the first powered, controlled flight on another planet on April 19, 2021. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the leading center for robotic exploration of the solar system.
NASA Video and Sound
The agency’s newest rover captured first-of-its-kind footage of its Feb. 18 touchdown and has recorded audio of Martian wind.
New video from NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover chronicles major milestones during the final minutes of its entry, descent, and landing (EDL) on the Red Planet on Feb. 18 as the spacecraft plummeted, parachuted, and rocketed toward the surface of Mars. A microphone on the rover also has provided the first audio recording of sounds from Mars.
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