"Here's some of the stories trending This
Week at NASA!"
On Tuesday, NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden
and other agency officials participated in
a public exploration forum at headquarters,
to showcase the path the agency has laid out
to put humans on Mars.
"NASA's path for the human exploration of
Mars begins in low Earth orbit.
Astronauts aboard the ISS are helping us learn
how to safely execute extended missions deeper
into space.
It's important to remember that NASA sent
humans to the moon by setting a goal that
seemed beyond our reach.
With Mars as our focus, we are steadily building
the capability to enable human missions to
Mars."
A hearing on Thursday of the Senate Appropriations
Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science
and Related Agencies, provided yet another
opportunity for the Administrator to testify
before legislators and continue the focus
on NASA's human path to Mars.
NASA is developing the capabilities needed
to send astronauts to an asteroid by 2025
and to Mars in the 2030s.
A Request For Information issued on Monday
by NASA, seeks conceptual ideas from the science
and engineering communities for a mission
to Jupiter's moon, Europa , which could address
fundamental questions about the Jovian moon
and the search for life beyond Earth.
Among the mission's primary objectives is
study of the liquid-water ocean believed to
be beneath Europa's icy crust.
Deadline to submit a mission concept is May
30.
The weather system that spawned tornadoes
across parts of several U.S. central and southern
states early in the week was seen from space
by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's
GOES-East satellite.
Meanwhile, infrared imagery from NASA's Aqua
satellite revealed the powerful storms extended
high into the troposphere.
The recent three-day stacking of all four
spacecraft for NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale
mission was condensed into this one minute
time-lapse.
The stacking at Goddard Space Flight Center,
was to prepare the spacecraft for vibration
testing, which simulates the conditions it
will experience during launch.
NASA plans to launch MMS in late 2014, to
study a phenomenon known as "magnetic reconnection"
-- a trigger of space weather events.
Monday and Tuesday night, a convoy carried
the disassembled NASA 905 Shuttle Carrier
Aircraft from Ellington Field, through the
streets of Houston's Clear Lake area to the
Space Center Houston visitor center, near
Johnson Space Center.
The 747 will be reassembled and put on permanent
public display at Space Center Houston.
One of two Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, NASA
905 safely transported space shuttles around
the country on 68 ferry flights from 1974
to September 2012.
NASA's Spinoffs 2013 can be seen on a computer
screen near you.
This edition of the online publication about
commercial products we use every day here
on Earth and made with technology developed
by NASA, features water filtration devices,
comfortable car seats, remote medical devices
and more.
Check out spinoff.nasa.gov to see just how
much space there is in our lives.
At a charity event in Los Angeles, NASA honored
actor William Shatner -- a life-long supporter
of space exploration -- with its Distinguished
Public Service medal ... the agency's highest
award for non-government personnel.
The award is presented to those who have personally
made a contribution representing substantial
progress to the NASA mission and must be so
extraordinary, that other forms of recognition
would be inadequate.
The citation for the medal reads, "For outstanding
generosity and dedication to inspiring new
generations of explorers around the world,
and for unwavering support for NASA and its
missions of discovery.
And that's what's up this week @NASA ...
For more on these and other stories follow
us on social media and visit www.nasa.gov/twan.
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