This week, we delivered an updated International Space Station Transition Report, detailing goals for the next decade of space station operations. Currently, NASA’s research and development activities aboard are advancing the technologies and procedures that will be necessary to send the first woman and first person of color to the Moon and the first humans to Mars.

For more than 20 years, scientists and researchers have used the ISS to conduct research into biological, physical, biomedicine, materials, and Earth and space science. The extension of operations to 2030 will continue to return benefits to the United States and to humanity as a whole while preparing for a successful transition of capabilities to one or more commercially-owned and -operated LEO destinations. It is NASA’s goal to be one of many customers of these commercial destination providers, purchasing only the goods and services the agency needs. Commercial destinations, along with commercial crew and cargo transportation, will provide the backbone of the low-Earth orbit economy after the International Space Station retires.

February Skywatching Tips – What's Up for February? Jupiter makes its exit at the end of the month, Venus reaches peak brightness mid-month, and the Great Nebula in Orion, the star-forming cloud next door, is visible to the unaided eye.

 Measuring Dark Matter: A Cosmic Puzzle – Dark matter is a mysterious, invisible material that is an important part of our universe, and there’s some right here in our solar system! Learn how scientists think we might measure it.

GOES-T launch – meet the Team – Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite T (GOES-T) satellite is the third satellite in the GOES-R Series, the Western Hemisphere’s most advanced weather observing and environmental monitoring system. Meet Lois M. Clutter, a mission communications engineer and a flight operations engineer, who makes sure the spacecraft’s communication requirements are met during prelaunch processing and launch operations.

Vande Hei's 300 Days in Space –

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei has lived in space continuously for 300 days since launching and docking to the orbiting lab on April 9, 2021. He is on his way to surpassing Christina Koch’s 328-day mission on March 3 and Scott Kelly’s 340 days on March 15. Vande Hei arrived at the station aboard the Soyuz MS-18 crew ship and will return to Earth on March 30 with a NASA astronaut record-breaking 355 consecutive days in Earth orbit.

Artemis I launch update – We will roll the combined Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft out of the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) for testing no earlier than March 2022. While the teams are not working any major issues, we’ve added additional time to complete closeout activities inside the VAB prior to rolling the rocket out for the first time.

Axiom Mission 1 crew members – NASA and its international partners approved crew members for Axiom Mission 1, Axiom Space’s first private astronaut mission to the International Space Station. The flight is targeted to launch Wednesday, March 30, from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on a flight-proven SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

Meet Brée Hill, a public affairs specialist at our Headquarters.

"I like [writing] because it helps me be able to create good strategic campaigns for NASA. I'm thinking outside of my own thought processes. … It helps with developing campaigns for programs people might not otherwise know about.”  

This image shows a white dwarf star that steadily burns at a relatively cool temperature and a highly variable red giant. This pair of stars is collectively known as R Aquarii. X-ray data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory (purple) show how a jet from the white dwarf is striking material surrounding it and creating shockwaves. Evidence for much older outbursts, caused when the white dwarf pulled material from the red giant onto its surface, is seen in the spectacular structures observed by our Hubble Space Telescope (red and blue).

Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/STScI, Palomar Observatory, DSS; Radio: NSF/NRAO/VLA; H-Alpha: LCO/IMACS/MMTF