Researchers from the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, UC-Berkeley, and St. Cloud State University talk about the importance of MIGHTI, a space weather instrument set to launch on the ICON mission next summer.

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/mighti-to-launch-on-icon/

We’re crowdsourcing images of the total solar eclipse this August to create a continuous view of the eclipse as it crosses the United States—take your camera or your phone and become a citizen scientist! Read about the Eclipse Megamovie Get the App for Android or iOS

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/the-eclipse-megamovie-project-…/

The space surrounding our planet is full of restless charged particles and roiling electric and magnetic fields, which create waves around Earth. One type of wave, plasmaspheric hiss, is particularly important for removing charged particles from the Van Allen radiation belts, a seething coil of particles encircling Earth, which can interfere with satellites and telecommunications. A new study published in Journal of Geophysical Research… [ 95 more words ]

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/van-allen-probes-surf-through-…/

This time-lapse video shows the integration of instruments into the ICON payload at the Space Dynamics Laboratory in Logan, Utah. The video covers a 15-week period from mid-February, 2016 until the end of May, 2016. Occasional darkness indicates cleanliness inspections using a UV light, and the blue tower that is occasionally visible is the last tracker used for alignment measurements. [ 72 more words ]

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/icon-payload-integration-timel…/

Mark your calendars for the Annual Novato Space Festival, Sunday August 6th, from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM. Meet legendary Astronauts from the Apollo, Space Shuttle and International Space Station Programs. NEW THIS YEAR... EARLY ENTRANCE at 9:30am for families with CHILDREN 12 & UNDER You'll get to browse the exhibit area first, THEN you'll get to meet Astronaut Jerry Ross and he will read to you from his children's book!

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/2017-novato-space-festival/

Data coming back from orbit seemed to not make sense. The glow at the equator changed from place to place around the Earth in ways we didn't expect. Now we are building the ICON mission, a satellite that will explore this region of the atmosphere, where Earth's weather meets space weather...It really takes a huge number of people working together to make a space science mission.

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/making-of-icon/

Dr. Manfred Bester, Manager of Mission Operations Center at the Space Sciences Lab of UC Berkeley, explains what he and his team do to prepare for the upcoming ICON launch.

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/icon-in-2-minutes-what-does-mi…/

As NASA’s Parker Solar Probe spacecraft begins its first historic encounter with the sun’s corona in late 2018—flying closer to our star than any other mission in history—a revolutionary cooling system will keep its solar arrays at peak performance, even in extremely hostile conditions. Every instrument and system on board Parker Solar Probe (with the exception of four antennas and a special particle detector) will be hidden from the sun behind a breakthrough thermal protection system (TPS)—an eight-foot diameter shield that the spacecraft uses to defend itself against the intense heat and energy of our star. [ 74 more words ]

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/parker-solar-probe-cool-power/

“MAVEN has made tremendous discoveries about the Mars upper atmosphere and how it interacts with the sun and the solar wind,” said Bruce Jakosky, MAVEN principal investigator from the University of Colorado, Boulder. “These are allowing us to understand not just the behavior of the atmosphere today, but how the atmosphere has changed through time.” During its 1,000 days in orbit, MAVEN has made a multitude of exciting discoveries. [ 115 more words ]

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/1000-days-in-orbit-mavens-top-…/

BBQ with Professor Stuart Bale #Summer

Five years ago, on June 13, 2012, Caltech's Fiona Harrison, principal investigator of NASA's NuSTAR mission, watched with her team as their black-hole-spying spacecraft was launched into space aboard a rocket strapped to the belly of an aircraft. The launch occurred over the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Many members of the team anxiously followed the launch from the mission's operations center at the University of California, Berkeley, anxious to see what NuSTAR would find. [ 60 more words ]

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/nustars-first-five-years-in-sp…/

The Parker Solar Probe, our first mission to touch the sun, was renamed on May 31st in honor of astrophysicist Eugene Parker. Here is a short video showing the mission and its objectives.

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/parker-solar-probe-follow-up/

CHICAGO – NASA has renamed the Solar Probe Plus spacecraft – humanity’s first mission to a star, which will launch in 2018 – as the Parker Solar Probe in honor of astrophysicist Eugene Parker. The announcement was made at a ceremony at the University of Chicago, where Parker serves as the S. Chandrasekhar Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus, Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics. [ 97 more words ]

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/nasa-renames-solar-probe-missi…/

Our ever-changing sun continuously shoots solar material into space. The grandest such events are massive clouds that erupt from the sun, called coronal mass ejections, or CMEs. These solar storms often come first with some kind of warning — the bright flash of a flare, a burst of heat or a flurry of solar energetic particles. But another kind of storm has puzzled scientists for its lack of typical warning signs: They seem to come from nowhere, and scientists call them stealth CMEs. [ 98 more words ]

http://www.ssl.berkeley.edu/space-weather-model-simulates-…/