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NASA Testing Advanced Capabilities for Moon, Mars Rovers

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NASA Testing Advanced Capabilities for Moon, Mars Rovers

Developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, ERNEST (Exploration Rover for Navigating Extreme Sloped Terrain) is used in a desert field test to help refine mobility hardware and autonomy software that could be used for a potential future long-range lunar rover mission. During the field test, which took place in March 2026 in the Colorado Desert of Southern California, the JPL team deployed ERNEST at all times of the day — including dusk, dawn, and nighttime, when lighting conditions create long shadows like those seen on the Moon’s polar regions. On a bleak stretch of the Colorado Desert in Southern California, a compact four-wheeled rover recently trundled about 16 miles (26 kilometers) with minimal intervention from the team of engineers trailing it. Called ERNEST (Exploration Rover for Navigating Extreme Sloped Terrain), this prototype is being used by NASA to advance both robotic autonomy and the ability to traverse challenging landscapes. Developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, ERNEST is 4 feet (1.2 meters) long. Not only can it lift each of its mesh wheels to get past obstacles that would stymie Curiosity and Perseverance, NASA’s six-wheeled Mars rovers, but the prototype also has enhanced independent decision-making capabilities. These mobility and autonomy advances could be infused into future missions that will venture to previously inaccessible areas of the Red Planet or the Moon. ERNEST serves as a testbed for a potential future lunar rover mission requiring high speeds and extreme distances. In a recent field test, the prototype traveled 16 miles over the course of 37 hours, going an order of magnitude above the top speed at which NASA’s current Mars rovers can navigate. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech In the field, ERNEST served as a testbed for a potential future lunar mission requiring higher speeds and much greater mileage than can be accomplished by current rovers. This technology could be used to inform future designs for exploration efforts on the Moon and beyond. “This testing is helping us refine the mobility hardware and autonomy software to navigate extreme distances across a wide range of terrain and lighting conditions anticipated on the Moon,” said Issa Nesnas, a principal technologist at JPL who led the recent testing as head of autonomy for a NASA mission concept for a potential future long-range lunar rover. Engineers from JPL set up illuminators after transporting ERNEST for a pre-sunrise test during a seven-day desert field campaign. NASA/JPL-Caltech Nesnas’ team is using ERNEST to demonstrate it is possible to build a rover that’s twice as big as the prototype and capable of a long-distance Moon mission. During the recent campaign, ERNEST traveled at speeds up to 0.6 mph (1 kph) over 37 hours of driving, across seven days of intermittent testing. That’s an order of magnitude above the top speed Perseverance and Curiosity can navigate. “You could do a science road trip across the Moon — or Mars — with this vehicle,” said James Keane, a JPL planetary scientist working on lunar missions. The initial goal of the team that developed ERNEST was mechanical: to design a relatively simple, low-cost rover that advances the trusted rocker-bogie suspension system featured on every Mars rover since NASA’s Sojourner. This passive system keeps relatively constant weight on all six wheels, thanks to pivot points and struts that enable each one to adapt to the changing surface. The mobility and autonomy advances developed at JPL for the ERNEST prototype rover could be infused into future NASA missions to previously inaccessible areas of the Red Planet or the Moon. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech On ERNEST, the active suspension lets the rover manage weight distribution among its wheels. Two powered joints in front articulate a gimbal that allows the rover to drive using different gaits like squirming, wheel-walking, and obstacle-climbing. With a clutch mechanism, it can switch between active and passive suspension, which is less terrain capable but more energy efficient. With four steerable wheels, it can drive in any direction, including sideways. “We started by postulating that we could do better in designing a planetary surface robotic mobility system,” said Hari Nayar, a JPL principal technologist leading the ERNEST team. “While the rocker-bogie system has been very successful over the past 30 years, there’s been a lot of research in that time on mobility and understanding terrain interaction.” Before arriving at today’s version of ERNEST, the team built two earlier prototypes , each about 2 feet (0.6 meters) long, to test 11 active suspension configurations. In a trailer filled with lunar regolith simulant, they ran experiments at different slope angles over several months before landing on a final design. Then the team scaled up, including adding a rectangular head mounted on a 4.5-foot-tall (1.4-meter-tall) mast. The hardware was completed in September 2024, but the rover still needed a human operator to joystick it, sending commands to instruct the rover on how to move over obstacles. In order to train the rover to think on its own, the ERNEST team turned to reinforcement learning, a type of artificial intelligence where the robot learns by interacting with its environment. The Dynamics and Real-Time Simulation Laboratory at JPL developed a high-fidelity virtual testing environment that replicates the rover’s behavior. The team fed the simulator data collected by engineers who documented the response of the actual rover hardware to a variety of terrain types. On a high-performance computing cluster, the team ran many simulations at once, sometimes completing thousands of hours of tests over a single weekend. After months of virtual training, the ERNEST team was ready to see if the rover could use its new autonomous algorithms to figure out how to drive over terrain features that would halt a passive-suspension rover. They set up an obstacle course with sand ripples, rubble piles, steps, and steep slopes in JPL’s Mars Yard, an outdoor terrain proving ground. Then they watched as the rover maneuvered the terrain on its own. Since then, ERNEST has completed many such courses. Nayar’s team is starting a new autonomy project which involves integrating the rover’s ability to determine when and how to use its active suspension with longer-range intelligent navigation. The goal is to enable ERNEST to plan an efficient path so that it can tackle surmountable obstacles and circumnavigate hazardous ones. These capabilities could contribute to potential future rover missions encountering formidable landscapes on Mars or more rugged areas of the Moon. Work on ERNEST began in 2022 was initially supported by JPL internal research and development funds. It is currently funded by NASA’s Mars Exploration Program and the agency’s Exploration Science Strategy and Integration Office in its Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages JPL for NASA. Media Contacts Karen Fox / Molly Wasser NASA Headquarters, Washington 240-285-5155 / 240-419-1732 [email protected]  / [email protected]    Melissa Pamer Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 626-314-4928 [email protected] 2026-040 Explore More 4 min read El Niño Is Underway Satellite observations of sea surface height indicated that the 2026 event continued to strengthen in… Article 20 hours ago 5 min read NASA’s Quantum Lab Aboard Space Station Gets Chilly Upgrade Article 2 days ago 3 min read Explore JPL to Take Place Oct. 10, 11 Article 3 days ago Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From NASA Earth’s Moon The Moon makes Earth more livable, sets the rhythm of ocean tides, and keeps a record of our solar system’s… Robotics Jet Propulsion Laboratory Solar System Exploration Program

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8 min czytania

NASA’s Lucy Reveals Wobbling, Peanut-Shaped Asteroid

Even small asteroids lead complex lives. During its flyby of the asteroid Donaldjohanson last year, NASA’s Lucy spacecraft revealed the asteroid to be a wobbly, peanut-shaped body that has undergone a lot of activity in its relatively short history. Formed as fragments coalesced after a violent collision 155 million years ago, the asteroid was transformed by the small but inexorable force of the Sun’s radiation, all while retaining signs of the brief presence of liquid water in its distant past. Zooming through the main asteroid belt toward one of the Jupiter Trojan asteroid groups, the Lucy spacecraft collected the first close-up images and other data at Donaldjohanson on April 20, 2025, as it passed 650 miles away from the asteroid. The data revealed that, instead of spinning simply around one axis like most other asteroids and planets, Donaldjohanson has a more complicated two-axis rotation. Scientists also saw Donaldjohanson’s peanut shape and the craters and ridges on its surface. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video A timelapse video made from images taken by NASA’s Lucy spacecraft as it approached the asteroid Donaldjohanson on April 20, 2025. The L’LORRI (Lucy Long Range Reconnaissance Imager) instrument, the spacecraft’s high-resolution black-and-white imager, collected these images over two hours as the spacecraft rapidly closed in on the asteroid from an initial separation of more than 58,000 miles (93,000 km), until the spacecraft passed a mere 650 miles (1000 km) from the 5-mile- (8 km-) wide asteroid. NASA/Goddard/SwRI/JHU-APL Lucy’s encounter with the asteroid was planned as a dress rehearsal for the spacecraft and mission team before its primary asteroid encounters, which begin with Lucy’s flyby of the Trojan asteroid Eurybates on Aug. 12, 2027. The instruments performed as expected, and, as a bonus, scientists got a rare opportunity to study a previously unexplored asteroid up close and to compare it to two asteroids with similar compositions but different histories: Bennu, the target of NASA’s OSIRIS-REx sample-return mission, and Ryugu, the site of JAXA’s (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) Hayabusa2 sample-return mission. Here’s what Lucy’s science team has learned so far from Lucy’s encounter with Donaldjohanson, as reported on June 18 in the journal Science . Wobbling rotation With Earth-based telescopes, observers saw fluctuations in the light Donaldjohanson reflects, regular patterns of peaks and valleys, typical of an elongated object rotating once every 10.5 Earth days. But Lucy’s data revealed another pattern: Donaldjohanson appears to be rotating like a wobbly top. Paper authors reported that the asteroid rotates end-over-end once every 10.5 Earth days, and wobbles back and forth around its long axis once every 26.5 days. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video The asteroid Donaldjohanson is shown slowly rotating in a tumbling, non-principal axis motion, with its angular momentum vector and rotation axes indicated. The surface is colored by gravity slope, which measures the angle between the local surface and the direction of gravity. Higher values (warmer colors) indicate steeper terrain relative to the local gravitational pull. Regions with limited stereo image coverage have been masked out where the shape model is less well constrained. Kel Elkins/NASA’s Science Visualization Studio/DLR Peanut shape While the Earth-based observations hinted at Donaldjohanson’s elongated shape, the Lucy flyby revealed a “bilobate” structure: two lobes connected by a neck, like a peanut. These lobes are likely two fragments from an asteroid collision that gently came together afterward by their mutual gravity. Donaldjohanson likely rotated at least 10 times faster when it formed, having slowed to its current rate in the last 20 to 60 million years, the team estimates. As it slowed, the balance between the centrifugal force pushing things apart and gravity pulling things together changed and loose rocky material slid down slopes creating the worn-down appearance of many craters, as the flyby images showed. The paper’s authors say that the asteroid’s slowing rotation is likely caused by a subtle consequence of solar heating known as the YORP effect. Each part of the asteroid’s Sun-warmed surface radiates heat away as infrared light, and that radiation imparts a tiny recoil force to the surface. Because the asteroid’s shape isn’t symmetric, this results in a net torque, or twist, that can change the asteroid’s rotation. Thus, YORP can slow asteroid spins down or speed them up, as in the case of Bennu (once every four hours) and Ryugu (once about every seven hours), which both likely used to rotate much slower than they do today. Fleeting water As it passed by Donaldjohanson at 30,000 mph, Lucy recorded the signatures of iron-rich clay minerals on the surface. These clays must have formed in the distant past with the help of liquid water. However, the exposure must have been brief, Lucy scientists concluded, because iron in clays tends to be replaced with other elements, such as magnesium, as water lingers. Indeed, scientists saw magnesium-rich clays at Bennu and Ryugu, which suggested prolonged water exposure, perhaps lasting millions of years, when they were still part of larger asteroids. This difference in water exposure history, and other characteristics, may mean that the parent bodies of these asteroids formed at different times or in different regions of the solar system before relocating to the main belt. Compare, contrast Donaldjohanson is thought to be made from rocky remnants of a larger, carbon- and water-rich asteroid that collided with another object in the main asteroid belt. Bennu and Ryugu are thought to have formed in the same way and in the same region. But Donaldjohanson is different. At 155 million years old, it is much younger than Bennu and Ryugu, which formed 1 to 2 billion years ago. Donaldjohanson also has remained in the asteroid belt since birth, while its wandering cousins migrated into orbits around the Sun that bring them close to Earth’s orbit about once a year (which made them perfect close targets for sample return missions). During its April 20, 2025, encounter with the main-belt asteroid Donaldjohanson, NASA’s Lucy spacecraft discovered evidence for iron-rich clays on the surface using its infrared spectrometer. These clays, which are similar to those found in carbon-rich meteorites such as QUE 97990, indicate that water was briefly present in the asteroid during the distant past. NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Dan Gallagher “It’s helpful for scientists to compare Donaldjohanson with asteroids like Bennu and Ryugu, which are seemingly similar asteroids, because every subtle difference is another clue to our origin story,” said Simone Marchi, Lucy deputy principal investigator and lead author of the study at the Boulder, Colorado, office of the Southwest Research Institute. “Once we start learning more about the Trojans, a completely different population of space rocks with very different histories, our understanding of solar system formation is destined to be challenged,” said Marchi. Named after a fossilized skeleton of a human ancestor discovered in Ethiopia in 1974, NASA’s Lucy will be the first mission to explore Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids, a population of well-preserved space rocks that formed early in our solar system’s history and could help scientists understand how the planets formed and moved around before settling in their current configuration. Download story graphics from NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio . About Lucy: Lucy’s principal investigator is based out of the Boulder, Colorado, branch of Southwest Research Institute, headquartered in San Antonio. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, provides overall mission management, systems engineering, and safety and mission assurance. Lockheed Martin Space in Littleton, Colorado, built the spacecraft. Lucy is the 13th mission in NASA’s Discovery Program. NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, manages the Discovery Program for the agency’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. For more information on NASA’s Lucy mission, visit: Lucy By Lonnie Shekhtman NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. and Katherine Kretke Southwest Research Institute, Boulder, Colo. Media Contacts: Karen Fox / Molly Wasser Headquarters, Washington 240-285-5155 / 240-419-1732 [email protected] / [email protected] Sarah Frazier NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. 202-853-7191 [email protected] Simplified Summary Zooming through the main asteroid belt toward one of the Jupiter Trojan asteroid groups, the Lucy spacecraft collected the first close-up images and other data at Donaldjohanson on April 20, 2025, as it passed 650 miles away from the asteroid. The data revealed that, instead of spinning simply around one axis like most other asteroids and planets, Donaldjohanson has a more complicated two-axis rotation. Scientists also saw Donaldjohanson’s peanut shape and the craters and ridges on its surface.

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Generation of waste excluding major mineral wastes per GDP unit

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Stages of Star Formation

This NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope Picture of the Month shows the giant molecular cloud Orion A, an area of the sky replete with star-forming clouds. ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, T. Megeath, M. Zamani (ESA/Webb) Acknowledgement: M. H. Özsaraç This image, captured by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and released on June 5, 2026, shows just a small portion of one of the Orion Molecular Clouds, a long and massive filament of cold gas and dust beyond the Orion Nebula. Every stage of star formation — from the youngest stellar embryos to protoplanetary discs to newly-minted pre-main sequence stars — is contained within this scene which stretches 150 light-years across. Read more about this image. Image credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, T. Megeath, M. Zamani (ESA/Webb) ; Acknowledgement: M. H. Özsaraç

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3 min czytania

Hubble Glimpses Merging Galaxy Clusters

Explore Hubble Hubble Home Overview About Hubble The History of Hubble Hubble Timeline Why Have a Telescope in Space? Hubble by the Numbers At the Museum FAQs Impact & Benefits Hubble’s Impact & Benefits Science Impacts Cultural Impact Technology Benefits Impact on Human Spaceflight Astro Community Impacts Science Hubble Science Science Themes Science Highlights Science Behind Discoveries Universe Uncovered Hubble’s Partners in Science Hubble & Citizen Science AI & Hubble Science Explore the Night Sky Observatory Hubble Observatory Hubble Design Mission Operations Science Operations Astronaut Missions to Hubble Hubble vs Webb Team Hubble Team Career Aspirations Hubble Astronauts Multimedia Images Videos Online Activities e-Books Sonifications Podcasts 3D Hubble Models Lithographs Fact Sheets Posters Hubble on the NASA App Glossary News Hubble News Social Media Media Resources 35th Anniversary More Online Activities 2 min read Hubble Glimpses Merging Galaxy Clusters This NASA Hubble Space Telescope image features a swarm of galaxies in the galaxy cluster called CL0016+1609 or MACS J0018.5+1626. NASA, ESA, H. Ebeling (University of Hawaii), D. Coe (STScI, ESA, JWST); Image Processing: G. Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America) This NASA Hubble Space Telescope image features a galaxy cluster, called CL0016+1609 or MACS J0018.5+1626, that is very bright at X-ray wavelengths and is one of the most extensively studied clusters at X-ray and radio wavelengths. The X-ray observations of this cluster revealed that it is two clusters merging along our line of sight. Researchers requested time to observe CL0016+1609 with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys because that data would help them accurately measure the cluster’s dark-matter distribution, which helps them study the merger and the role of CL0016+1609 in the large-scale structure of the universe. Hubble can’t directly see dark matter, but its infrared and visible light observations can detect dark matter’s gravitational lensing effects on the normal matter Hubble observes. The data in this image also includes observations with Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 taken as part of an observing program that obtained the first Hubble infrared images of 46 massive galaxy clusters and looked for distant galaxies gravitationally lensed by these clusters. Called RELICS (Reionization Lensing Cluster Survey), this survey found some 300 high-redshift candidate galaxies lensed by these clusters. You can see the faint vertical arc of one of these distant galaxies in the image above. Look for it just to the left of the large elliptical galaxies in the center of the image. Another brighter, though shorter arc is visible just above and to the right of the large elliptical galaxies in the center of the image. Facebook logo @NASAHubble @NASAHubble Instagram logo @NASAHubble Media Contact : Claire Andreoli NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center , Greenbelt, MD [email protected] Share Details Last Updated Jun 18, 2026 Editor Andrea Gianopoulos Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms Hubble Space Telescope Astrophysics Astrophysics Division Galaxies Galaxy clusters Goddard Space Flight Center The Universe Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From Hubble Hubble Space Telescope Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe. Hubble’s Galaxies Hubble Science Highlights Hubble Images

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6 min czytania

El Niño Is Underway

Earth Observatory Science Earth Observatory El Niño Is Underway Earth Earth Observatory Image of the Day EO Explorer Topics All Topics Atmosphere Land Heat & Radiation Life on Earth Human Dimensions Natural Events Oceans Remote Sensing Technology Snow & Ice Water More Content Collections Global Maps World of Change Articles Earth Matters Blog Blue Marble: Next Generation EO Kids Mission: Biomes About About Us Subscribe 🛜 RSS Contact Us Search Higher-than-normal sea surfaces (red) are visible in the central and eastern Pacific on June 8, 2026, a few days before El Niño was declared. Data for the map were acquired by the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite and processed by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). NASA Earth Observatory/Lauren Dauphin El Niño, characterized by warmer-than-normal water temperatures in parts of the equatorial Pacific, made its return in June 2026. Observations of sea surface height from the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite that month indicated that the 2026 event was continuing to strengthen. The natural, recurring phenomenon can have widespread effects, typically bringing wetter conditions to the U.S. Southwest and drought to countries in the western Pacific, such as Indonesia and Australia. NOAA declared an El Niño on June 11, after sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific measured at least 0.5 degrees Celsius above average for several consecutive months. Meanwhile, NASA scientists have been observing a complementary sign of El Niño: areas of elevated sea surface height. When ocean water warms, it expands in volume and causes the sea surface to rise—making the water’s height a reliable indicator of ocean temperatures. Warmer-than-normal temperatures, hence higher sea surface heights, in parts of the equatorial Pacific Ocean are associated with El Niño. The map above depicts sea surface height anomalies across the central and eastern Pacific Ocean as observed on June 8, 2026. Shades of red indicate sea levels that were higher than average. Normal sea level conditions appear white, and lower areas are blue. Data for the map were acquired by the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite—launched in 2020 by NASA and led by ESA (European Space Agency)—and processed by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Note that signals related to seasonal cycles and long-term trends have been removed to highlight sea level anomalies associated with El Niño and other short-term natural phenomena. Earlier in spring 2026, the satellite started to detect precursor signs of El Niño as swells of warm water hundreds of miles wide, known as Kelvin waves, moved from the western Pacific to the eastern Pacific. That happens when trade winds in the western equatorial Pacific weaken and then temporarily reverse to blow from the west. Warm water piles up in the east, deepening the warm surface layer, lowering the thermocline , and suppressing the upwelling that usually keeps waters along the Pacific coasts of the Americas cooler. This buildup of heat beneath the water’s surface is what sea surface height observations capture. It goes beyond surface temperature measurements to indicate how much heat is stored in the subsurface. That’s important because a shallow warm layer might not have much impact on climate and weather, while a large reservoir of heat below the surface can matter more. According to JPL sea level researcher Severine Fournier, deputy project scientist for Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich, conditions in the western Pacific on June 8 looked similar to those from the same time in 1997, a year when an exceptionally strong El Niño emerged. Warm conditions in the eastern Pacific in 2026 have lagged behind, however, with fewer Kelvin waves built up by the same date. Still, more warm Kelvin waves appeared to be approaching the eastern Pacific, meaning El Niño was still strengthening. Whether it catches up to 1997 depends on ocean activity in the coming weeks. “For now, it looks like it’s going to be a big one—more so than I would have said last week—but we still need more observations to know what’s going to happen.” NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2023) processed by the European Space Agency and further processed by Josh Willis, Severin Fournier, and Kevin Marlis/NASA/JPL-Caltech. Story by Kathryn Hansen. Downloads June 8, 2026 JPEG (1.19 MB) References & Resources Climate Prediction Center/NCEP/NWS (2026, June 11) El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion . Accessed June 17, 2026. NASA Earth Observatory (2025, September 25) El Niño . Accessed June 17, 2026. NASA Earth Observatory (2023, June 21) El Niño Returns . Accessed June 17, 2026. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (2026, May 27) NASA-European Sea Level Mission Homes in on El Niño . Accessed June 17, 2026. NOAA (2026, June 11) El Nino forms, expected to strengthen, say NOAA forecasters . Accessed June 17, 2026. You may also be interested in: Stay up-to-date with the latest content from NASA as we explore the universe and discover more about our home planet. Barents Sea Tied to Low Arctic Sea Ice 4 min read Patches of open water in the region contributed to low sea ice extent across the Arctic in March 2026, which… Article New Eruption in the Bismarck Sea 5 min read Satellite imagery shows a surge of new volcanic activity in the ocean near Papua New Guinea. Article Color Off the Mid-Atlantic Coast 4 min read Something is brewing in shallow waters offshore of Delaware, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia. Article 1 2 3 4 Next Keep Exploring Discover More from NASA Earth Science Subscribe to Earth Observatory Newsletters Subscribe to the Earth Observatory and get the Earth in your inbox. Earth Observatory Image of the Day NASA’s Earth Observatory brings you the Earth, every day, with in-depth stories and stunning imagery. Explore Earth Science Earth Science Data Open access to NASA’s archive of Earth science data

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4 min czytania

NASA Announces Public-Private Partnership to Advance Mars Science

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman announces a public-private partnership to advance Mars science during an event at Relativity Space on June 17, 2026. Credit: Relativity Space NASA Wednesday announced a new public‑private partnership to advance Mars science by combining the agency’s scientific leadership with commercial innovation. Under this model, NASA will provide the Aeolus atmospheric‑science instrument payload suite, while Relativity Space supplies the spacecraft, rocket, and cruise operations necessary to deliver the instruments to Mars. This partnership reflects NASA’s growing commitment to approaches that accelerate discovery, expand mission cadence, and strengthen the foundation for future human exploration. By leveraging commercial investment and development capacity, NASA can focus resources on high‑value science while enabling more frequent opportunities to gather critical data about Mars, data essential to safely navigating the Martian atmosphere and ultimately landing humans on the surface. “Public-private partnerships like this are a force multiplier for science,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. “By pairing NASA’s world‑class instruments with commercial innovation and investment, we can deliver more science, more often, and reduce the time it takes to get essential data into the hands of researchers preparing for future human missions to Mars.” Aeolus, scheduled to launch in 2028, is a NASA‑developed suite of four complementary instruments designed to provide the first integrated, daily, global view of Martian winds, temperatures, dust, and clouds. By improving models for dust, winds, temperature, and seasonal atmospheric behavior, Aeolus will generate the detailed environmental knowledge required to reduce risk for future crewed and uncrewed landings. These measurements will directly inform entry, descent, and landing systems and support safer, more predictable mission planning for astronauts. Aeolus builds on more than two decades of NASA missions that have studied the Martian atmosphere, including orbiters such as MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution), the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, and Mars Odyssey, while taking the foundation laid by earlier missions even further, continuing NASA’s tradition of expanding the frontiers of Mars science. Researchers at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley will design, build, and integrate the payload, while Relativity Space will manage spacecraft development and mission operations. “As NASA’s Innovation Center of Excellence, Ames is committed to delivering the technologies, capabilities, and creative partnerships that enable the agency’s boldest missions,” said Dr. Eugene Tu, center director, NASA Ames. “Aeolus reflects how innovative collaboration accelerates science and strengthens the foundation needed for one day landing humans on Mars.” The Aeolus payload suite includes four NASA‑built instruments: Doppler Wind and Temperature Sounder (DWTS‑Ozone): Measures wind and temperature profiles from the surface up to approximately 37 miles (60 km). A collaboration with GATS. Thermal Limb Sounder (TLS): Provides vertical temperature profiles and observations of dust and water‑ice clouds. A collaboration with Xiomas Technologies. Surface Radiometric Sensor Package (SuRSeP): Measures surface energy balance, dust, and cloud properties. Wide‑Field Context Camera (WFCC): Captures daily global images of atmospheric activity. NASA will support operations of science instruments for at least one Martian year, while Relativity Space maintains the spacecraft. As part of the agreement, NASA will develop the data‑processing pipeline needed to transform raw measurements into high‑quality, ready‑to‑use data products for broad scientific use. This effort is supported under NASA’s first six‑year reimbursable Space Act Agreement, providing a stable framework for sustained collaboration, predictable development, and mission continuity. Learn more about Mars science at: https://science.nasa.gov/mars -end- Camille Gallo / Cheryl Warner Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1600 [email protected] / [email protected] Jeanne Neal Ames Research Center, Silicon Valley 650-604-4789 [email protected] Share Details Last Updated Jun 18, 2026 Editor Jessica Taveau Location NASA Headquarters Related Terms Mars Ames Research Center Commercial Space Partner With Us Science Mission Directorate