| In this week’s newsletter, explore 6,000 exoplanets… and counting; find out when and where to watch the upcoming launch of three new space weather missions; and discover why organ chips containing crew cells will accompany the Artemis II astronauts on their journey around the Moon. Plus, more stories you might have missed. |
| The official number of exoplanets—planets outside our solar system—tracked by NASA has reached 6,000. Confirmed planets are added to the count on a rolling basis by scientists from around the world, so no single planet is considered the 6,000th entry. The number is monitored by the agency’s Exoplanet Science Institute, based at Caltech’s Infrared Processing and Analysis Center in Pasadena, California. There are more than 8,000 additional candidate planets awaiting confirmation, with NASA leading the world in searching for life in the universe. “This milestone represents decades of cosmic exploration driven by NASA space telescopes—exploration that has completely changed the way humanity views the night sky,” said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, acting director, Astrophysics Division, NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Step by step, from discovery to characterization, NASA missions have built the foundation to answering a fundamental question: Are we alone? Now, with our upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and Habitable Worlds Observatory, America will lead the next giant leap—studying worlds like our own around stars like our Sun. This is American ingenuity and a promise of discovery that unites us all.” SEARCHING FOR OTHER WORLDS |
 | THE UNIVERSE Exoplanet Catalog This exoplanetary encyclopedia—continuously updated, with more than 6,000 entries—combines interactive 3D models and detailed data on all confirmed exoplanets. EXPLORE INTRIGUING WORLDS |
| SCIENCE Space Weather Missions Launching NASA will provide live launch coverage for IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe), an observatory designed to study space weather. Launching with IMAP are two rideshare missions, NASA’s Carruthers Geocorona Observatory and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Follow On-Lagrange 1, both of which will provide insight into space weather and its impacts on Earth. Live coverage will begin at 6:40 a.m. EDT on Tuesday, Sept. 23. LAUNCH COVERAGE |  |
 MULTIMEDIA A Shared Frontier NASA has earned a spot on The Webby 30, a curated list celebrating 30 companies and organizations that have shaped the digital landscape. The Webby Awards recognize companies across technology, media, entertainment, and social media that have consistently demonstrated creativity and innovation on their digital platforms. NASA’s inclusion in the list underscores the agency’s long-standing commitment to sharing its awe-inspiring missions, discoveries, and educational resources with audiences around the globe. LEARN MORE |  THE SOLAR SYSTEM Asteroid Donaldjohanson Regions Named The International Astronomical Union, an international non-governmental research organization and global naming authority for celestial objects, has approved official names for features on Donaldjohanson, an asteroid the Lucy spacecraft visited on April 20. In a nod to the fossilized inspiration for the names of the asteroid and spacecraft, the IAU’s selections recognize significant sites and discoveries on Earth that further our understanding of humanity’s origins. LEARN MORE |
| More NASA News |
 | On Thursday at 7:24 a.m. EDT, NASA’s Northrop Grumman CRS-23 mission arrived at the International Space Station. The mission launched on Sept. 14 and carried more than 11,000 pounds of scientific investigations and cargo to support research on the orbiting laboratory. |
 | The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will help scientists better understand our Milky Way galaxy’s less sparkly components—gas and dust strewn between stars. One of Roman’s major observing programs, the Galactic Plane Survey, will peer through our galaxy to its most distant edge, mapping roughly 20 billion stars—about four times more than have currently been mapped. |
 | The Sun has become increasingly active since 2008; it’s a trend that NASA researchers say could lead to an uptick in space weather events, such as solar storms, flares, and coronal mass ejections. Scientists track these space weather events because they can affect spacecraft, astronauts’ safety, radio communications, GPS, and even power grids on Earth. |
 | With the end of summer approaching in the Northern Hemisphere, the extent of sea ice in the Arctic shrank to its annual minimum on Sept. 10, according to scientists at NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The total sea ice coverage was tied with 2008 for the 10th-lowest on record at 1.78 million square miles. |
 | In a nearby stellar neighborhood, a burned-out star is snacking on a fragment of a Pluto-like object. With its unique ultraviolet capability, only the Hubble Space Telescope could identify that this meal is taking place. |
| ARTEMIS A Passenger for Research Organ chips containing crew cells will accompany the Artemis II astronauts on their journey around the Moon. The AVATAR (A Virtual Astronaut Tissue Analog Response) investigation seeks to understand the individualized effects of extreme radiation and microgravity on each astronaut. This research, combined with other studies on the health and performance of the Artemis II crew, will give NASA insight into how to best protect astronauts as exploration expands to the surface of the Moon, Mars, and beyond. A TRAILBLAZING EXPERIMENT |  |
| Do You Know? |
 |
| When astronauts return from space, mission plans specify precisely where the spacecraft will land. But precautions are also taken in case of an emergency or malfunction that would cause a spacecraft to land off-course. From the very beginning of NASA’s human spaceflight program, astronauts have undergone survival training, and a survival kit is stowed in their spacecraft. Some of the contents of the spacecraft survival kit have remained the same over the years, but others have changed. |
| Which item was not included in survival kits for NASA’s first human spaceflights in the 1960s? A. A first aid kit B. Shark repellent C. An emergency blanket D. Seawater desalting tablets E. A whistle |
| Find out the answer in next week’s NASA newsletter! |
 | Last week, we asked about the informal name by which President Kennedy’s September 12, 1962, speech at Rice University is best known. The answer? “We choose to go to the Moon.” While this speech was delivered more than 60 years ago in the midst of the Cold War, many of its themes still resonate today. |
 |
| Do you have a telescope? Would you like to see some of the same night sky objects from the ground that Hubble has seen from space? We invite you to commemorate the Hubble Space Telescope’s 35th anniversary by accepting our yearlong stargazing challenge! New challenge objects will be featured weekly. This week’s object is the globular cluster Messier 75, located 67,500 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius. Pierre Méchain discovered Messier 75 in August of 1780. Charles Messier observed the cluster in October 1780 and added it to his catalog after determining its position. Messier 75 holds roughly 400,000 stars and is surprisingly easy to see in binoculars and telescopes thanks to its extremely condensed center. However, because of its compact nature, Messier 75 looks very similar to a star when viewed in binoculars. Telescopes 10 inches across or larger should be able to resolve some of the stars in the cluster. JOIN THE CELEBRATION |
NOTE: This is a NASA publication. Used with permission and formatted to fit this screen.
is the comment system working yet?
Continued test of comment system. Jetpack components known to break WordPress default comment system. Let’s check by making sure this posts.
Confirmed. Toxic Jetpack components removed.