NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, left, and NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy are seen during an Earth-to-space call with astronauts aboard the International Space Station, Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025, at the Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters building in Washington. Nelson and Melroy spoke with NASA astronauts Nick Hague, Butch Wilmore, Suni Williams, and Don Pettit. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Center: HQ

Photographer: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Location: NASA Headquarters

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission One is on its way to the Moon as part of NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative. The Blue Ghost lander launched from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2025 carrying 10 NASA science and technology instruments to the lunar surface to further understand the Moon and help prepare for future human missions.

Center: KSC

Photographer: NASA/SpaceX

Location: Launch Complex 39A

The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial is seen, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Washington. The memorial covers four acres and includes the Stone of Hope, a granite statue of civil rights movement leader Martin Luther King Jr. carved by sculptor Lei Yixin. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Center: HQ

Photographer: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Location: Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial

His Excellency Dato Paduka Serbini Ali, Ambassador of Brunei to the United States, right, and NASA Administrator Bill Nelson speak during a courtesy visit, Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025 at the Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters building in Washington. Photo Credit: (NASA/Joel Kowsky)

Center: HQ

Photographer: NASA/Joel Kowsky

Location: NASA Headquarters

“How does NASA collect surface samples from the Moon? The answer may surprise you! Explore the challenges of designing the geology sampling equipment for the Artemis missions and how geology sampling technology has changed since Apollo missions.” 125%

Center: JSC

NASA’s SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer), a space telescope, is situated on a work stand ahead of prelaunch operations at the Astrotech Processing Facility at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on Friday, Jan. 17, 2025. SPHEREx will enter a polar orbit around Earth and create a 3D map of the entire sky, gathering information about millions of galaxies for scientists to study what happened after the big bang, the history of galaxy evolution, and the origins of water in planetary systems in our galaxy. SPHEREx will launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in late February 2025.

Center: KSC

Photographer: USSF 30th Space Wing/Christopher

Location: Astrotech, Vandenberg Space Forc

This time lapse video shows the Lunar Occultation of Mars visible from New Orleans, Louisiana, on Monday evening, Jan. 13, 2025. The Wolf Moon, also known as the Ice or Cold Moon, was full at 5:27 p.m. EST. This first full moon of the year also blocked the planet Mars for around an hour between 9:00 p.m. EST and 9:58 p.m. EST on Monday, Jan. 13. This rare event occurred just as Mars reached its closest point to Earth since December 2022. New Orleans is home to NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility, where several pieces of hardware for the SLS (Space Launch system) are being built.

Center: MAF

Photographer: NASA/Michael DeMocker

Location: New Orleans, LA. USA.

A Gravite 3d clinostat is in the Microgravity Simulation Support Facility (MSSF) inside the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Feb. 11, 2020. The facility was developed to provide ground simulation capability to the U.S. research community in order to supplement the limited opportunities to access the International Space Station and other platforms for microgravity research. The MSSF is designed to support biological research on microorganisms, cells, tissues, small plants and small animals. The simulator provides NASA with an alternative platform for microgravity research and creates the opportunity to conduct experiments on the space station in parallel with conditions of simulated microgravity on the ground.

Center: KSC

Photographer: NASA/Kim Shiflett

Location: O&C

NASA’s SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer), a space telescope, is situated on a work stand ahead of prelaunch operations at the Astrotech Processing Facility at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on Friday, Jan. 17, 2025. SPHEREx will enter a polar orbit around Earth and create a 3D map of the entire sky, gathering information about millions of galaxies for scientists to study what happened after the big bang, the history of galaxy evolution, and the origins of water in planetary systems in our galaxy. SPHEREx will launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in late February 2025.

Center: KSC

Photographer: USSF 30th Space Wing/Christopher

Location: Astrotech, Vandenberg Space Forc

Creating a golden streak in the night sky, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission One lander soars upward after liftoff from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2025 as part of NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative. The Blue Ghost lander will carry 10 NASA science and technology instruments to the lunar surface to further understand the Moon and help prepare for future human missions.

Center: KSC

Photographer: NASA/Cory S Huston

Location: NASA Causeway

jsc2025e000004 (2024) --- View of ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst activating the Electromagnetic Levitator (EML), a microgravity furnace for metals, inside Europe's Columbus module of the International Space Station during his 2014 Blue Dot mission.

Center: JSC

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, left, and NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy are seen during an Earth-to-space call with astronauts aboard the International Space Station, Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025, at the Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters building in Washington. Nelson and Melroy spoke with NASA astronauts Nick Hague, Butch Wilmore, Suni Williams, and Don Pettit. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Center: HQ

Photographer: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Location: NASA Headquarters

Water flow test to check ignition overpressure and sound protection system with the mobile launcher 1 and launch pad 39B for the Artemis II mission.

Center: KSC

Photographer: NASA/Jamie Peer

Location: SLC-39B

NASA’s SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer), a space telescope, arrives at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on Tuesday, Jan. 14, 2025. SPHEREx will enter a polar orbit around Earth and create a 3D map of the entire sky, gathering information about millions of galaxies for scientists to study what happened after the big bang, the history of galaxy evolution, and the origins of water in planetary systems in our galaxy. SPHEREx will launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in late February 2025.

Center: KSC

Photographer: USSF 30th Space Wing/Carlos Vela

Location: Astrotech

Srujana Neelam, a researcher working at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, dissects Arabidopsis thaliana plants from petri plates used in microgravity simulation devices in the Microgravity Simulation Support Facility (MSSF) inside the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout building on Feb. 11, 2020. The facility was developed to provide ground simulation capability to the U.S. research community in order to supplement the limited opportunities to access the International Space Station and other platforms for microgravity research. The MSSF is designed to support biological research on microorganisms, cells, tissues, small plants and small animals. The simulator provides NASA with an alternative platform for microgravity research and creates the opportunity to conduct experiments on the space station in parallel with conditions of simulated microgravity on the ground.

Center: KSC

Photographer: NASA/Kim Shiflett

Location: O&C

Teams at Bechtel National, Inc. use a crane to lift Module 4 into place atop the mobile launcher 2 tower chair at its Kennedy Space Center park site on January 3, 2025. Module 4 is the first of seven modules that will be stacked vertically to make up the almost 400-foot launch tower that will be used beginning with the Artemis IV mission.

Center: KSC

Photographer: Bechtel National; Inc.

Location: Kennedy Space Center

Teams at Bechtel National, Inc. use a crane to lift Module 4 into place atop the mobile launcher 2 tower chair at its Kennedy Space Center park site on January 3, 2025. Module 4 is the first of seven modules that will be stacked vertically to make up the almost 400-foot launch tower that will be used beginning with the Artemis IV mission.

Center: KSC

Photographer: Bechtel National; Inc.

Location: Kennedy Space Center

Liftoff! NASA’s Space Launch System carrying the Orion spacecraft lifts off the pad at Launch Complex 39B at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 1:47 a.m. EST on Nov. 16, 2022. The first in a series of increasingly complex missions, Artemis I will provide a foundation for human deep space exploration and demonstrate our commitment and capability to extend human presence to the Moon and beyond. The primary goal of Artemis I is to thoroughly test the integrated systems before crewed missions by operating the spacecraft in a deep space environment, testing Orion’s heat shield, and recovering the crew module after reentry, descent, and splashdown.

Center: KSC

Photographer: NASA/Chris Coleman and Kevin Dav

Location: LC-39B

Jeffrey Richards, a payload research and science coordinator on the LASSO contract at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, prepares an experiment for a test in an Airbus Random Positioning Machine in the Microgravity Simulation Support Facility (MSSF) inside the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Feb. 11, 2020. The facility was developed to provide ground simulation capability to the U.S. research community in order to supplement the limited opportunities to access the International Space Station and other platforms for microgravity research. The MSSF is designed to support biological research on microorganisms, cells, tissues, small plants and small animals. The simulator provides NASA with an alternative platform for microgravity research and creates the opportunity to conduct experiments on the space station in parallel with conditions of simulated microgravity on the ground.

Center: KSC

Photographer: NASA/Kim Shiflett

Location: O&C

The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial is seen in the foregound with the Washington Monument in the background, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Washington. The memorial covers four acres and includes the Stone of Hope, a granite statue of civil rights movement leader Martin Luther King Jr. carved by sculptor Lei Yixin. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Center: HQ

Photographer: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Location: Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial