We solve complex research, engineering, and analytical problems that present critical challenges to our nation. APL—the nation’s largest university affiliated research center—provides U.S. government agencies with deep expertise in specialized fields to support national priorities and technology development programs. We also serve as independent trusted technical agents to the government, providing continuity for highly complex, multigenerational technology development systems.
Our purpose is to make critical contributions to critical challenges. At APL, we feel it is our responsibility to try to solve these national challenges with the full measure of our dedication and expertise.
The Lab’s core values are unquestionable integrity, trusted service to the nation, world-class expertise, and game-changing impact—all in an environment that is collaborative, fulfilling (and even fun!).
APL’s purpose and core values guide our future, and it is no less than to create defining innovations that ensure our nation’s preeminence in the 21st century.
January 21, 2021
In a new paper published Jan. 8 in the journal Soft Robotics, a team of APL researchers demonstrated a liquid crystal elastomer-based soft robot that is fully untethered from a power source and has Bluetooth control.
January 15, 2021
As integration and testing continue on the spacecraft, DART’s investigation team has kicked off the mission’s final prelaunch observation campaign on the ground, using powerful telescopes located around the world in an effort to get a glimpse of the asteroid system that DART will encounter this year.
January 15, 2021
The APL team that stood up the Lunar Science and Innovation Consortium, an organization to help NASA advance the development of lunar surface technology, will receive a NASA Headquarters 2020 Honor Award.
January 14, 2021
As the COVID-19 pandemic persists into a second year and conducting disease surveillance continues to be an important component of public health responses, APL has entered into an agreement with InductiveHealth Informatics to facilitate access by additional state and local governments to the APL-developed Electronic Surveillance System for the Early Notification of Community-based Epidemics, or ESSENCE.
December 29, 2020
An APL-led mission to explore electric currents in Earth’s atmosphere that link the aurora to our planet’s magnetosphere has been selected by NASA to move forward to a scheduled launch in 2024.
December 18, 2020
A new technique to study the atmospheres of exoplanets that never pass in front of or behind their stars could be revolutionary for exoplanet research, opening up a huge population of potentially habitable planets that have been inaccessible to scientific study.
December 16, 2020
The Johns Hopkins APL team building the MEGANE spectrometer for Japan’s MMX mission to the Martian moons recently shipped a test model of the instrument. The model will determine how well the instrument fits in the spacecraft design.
December 10, 2020
Almost two years into a research study conducted by Johns Hopkins APL and Johns Hopkins Medicine, a quadriplegic patient can now control two robotic arms with his brain — and can even feed himself.
December 8, 2020
A team is developing new tools to help search for life beyond Earth, including chips that isolate biomolecules critical to life and a thumb-drive-size sequencer that could read genetic material from another world.
