Space Science Snapshots
Have a seat and take a quick trip into space! At APL, our space scientists and engineers strive every day to break new ground—through research, spacecraft and instrument designs, and much more. Check out these snapshots of their innovative work, which are helping to inform policymakers, cut the costs of exploration, and push the boundaries of space and planetary science.
New Data Shows Asteroid Will Miss the Moon in 2032
An APL-led team used data from the James Webb Space Telescope to improve the measurements of the orbit of asteroid 2024 YR4, reducing the odds of a lunar impact in 2032 from 4% to zero.
Extensive Diversity of Rock Types Discovered in Ancient Mars Valley
Mastcam-Z multispectral image mosaics from NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover reveal a striking diversity of rocks swept into Jezero crater by powerful ancient floods. Carried from beyond the crater’s rim, these rocks hold clues to Mars’ deep past and the story behind the samples Perseverance is collecting.
Direct Evidence for Preferential Ion Heating Below the Sun’s Alfvén Surface
A new Parker Solar Probe study reveals strong preferential heating and acceleration of solar wind ions below the Sun’s Alfvén surface, highlighting this boundary as a key region for ion energization.
Minutes Before Substorms Begin, Low-Frequency Waves Surge Through the Ionosphere and Auroral Beads Snap Into Regular Structures
This APL-led study reports the discovery of low-frequency (10 mHz) oscillations in the ionosphere and auroral bead structuring, both of which are linked to a plasma instability around substorm onsets.
Reconstructing Masses and Directions of Solar Ejecta
A new study uses the unique viewpoints enabled by the APL-led dual-spacecraft STEREO mission to reconstruct the fundamental properties of 1,000+ coronal mass ejections.
Unexpectedly High Interstellar Particle Temperature Detected in the Outer Heliosphere
A new study reveals that higher pickup-ion temperatures measured by the APL-built New Horizons spacecraft arise from higher solar wind speed and shock heating, which could boost production of energetic neutral atoms (ENAs).
Identifying Fast Ion Acceleration in Small Solar Flares
The APL-built Suprathermal Ion Spectrograph (SIS) instrument on Solar Orbiter has shown that small solar flares accelerate ions in just minutes, surprisingly much faster than the hours needed in shock-associated events.
Auroral “Purple Rain” Reveals Deep Radiation Belt Injection
New research by the APL-led Center for Geospace Storms combining modeling and auroral imaging reveals a connection between dazzling purple aurora and the rapid buildup of radiation belt “killer electrons.”
Constellation Data Provides Accurate Global Maps of Geospace Magnetic Field
APL’s AMPERE project uses data from the 66+ Iridium satellites to map variations of Earth’s magnetic field. AMPERE data products are in excellent agreement with “gold standard” data from the Swarm mission.
APL Citizen Scientists Capture Eclipse Magnetic Perturbation
The APL-led EZIE-Mag eclipse campaign used ultra-low-cost magnetometers and citizen scientists to reveal geomagnetic signatures of the 2024 solar eclipse.
SuperMAG Data Captures an Extreme Auroral Electrojet Spike in 2023 Geomagnetic Storm
An APL-led magnetometer data service captured an auroral electrojet spike during an April 24, 2023, geomagnetic storm. The spike is extreme in magnitude, explosive in nature, and global in spatial extent, representing a potentially new type of disturbance.
Magnetic Energy Hiding at Small Scales in the Low Solar Atmosphere
An APL-led study shows that a long-used solar magnetograph underestimates the magnetic flux and energy released in the Sun’s low corona, which could power the fast solar wind observed by Parker Solar Probe.