The Zooniverse, a NASA grantee that runs the world’s largest platform for online people-powered research, has reached an extraordinary milestone: 1 billion classifications contributed by volunteers around the world. This milestone is a celebration of everyone who has marked a dip in a light curve, confirmed the presence of a moving object in a short video, or identified species in a camera trap image. Each of these small contributions collectively advances our understanding of the universe.
A total of 31 NASA-sponsored citizen science projects have been hosted on Zooniverse, accounting for 120 million classifications by 324 thousand volunteers since 2020. Through projects like Planet Hunters TESS, Daily Minor Planet, Backyard Worlds: Planet 9, Space Umbrella, and Snapshot Wisconsin, volunteers help discover exoplanets, identify near-Earth objects and asteroids, search for brown dwarfs and planetary systems, analyze effects of the solar wind, and inform wildlife management decisions. These projects have led to 96 scientific publications, and 56 of these articles feature NASA citizen scientists as co-authors to recognize the significance of their research contributions. These efforts demonstrate how public participation can accelerate discovery by combining human curiosity and pattern recognition with data from NASA missions and observatories. Collaboration between volunteers, scientists, and computing technology will be even more important in the future as we tackle enormous and complex datasets, like those from NASA’s upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.
“One billion classifications represent far more than a number; it’s one billion moments of curiosity transformed into meaningful contributions to research,” said Laura Trouille, principal investigator of Zooniverse and vice president of Science Engagement at the Adler Planetarium. “Every classification on Zooniverse brings us one step closer to new discoveries and a deeper understanding of our universe, our world, and ourselves.”
Zooniverse is the world’s largest platform for people-powered research. Co-founded by the Adler Planetarium and the University of Oxford, with the University of Minnesota serving as a key institutional partner, Zooniverse enables anyone, anywhere to contribute directly to real scientific research. Through its six-year collaboration with NASA, Zooniverse provides science-enabling infrastructure to NASA researchers through tools and a community of more than 3 million registered volunteers.
Ground displacement was especially intense near Caracas and La Guaira, Venezuela, after earthquakes struck the region on June 24, 2026. The map was derived from NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar) data acquired on June 25 and June 30 (after the earthquakes) and June 13 and June 18 (before the earthquakes).
NASA Earth Observatory/Lauren Dauphin
On June 24, 2026, a magnitude 7.2 earthquake struck northern Venezuela, followed under a minute later by a magnitude 7.5 mainshock. Together, the quakes left immense damage and loss of life across the region. In the days that followed, satellite-based maps of ground displacement revealed how the land surface moved, providing insight into the forces behind the severe destruction in locations such as La Guaira and other coastal cities in La Guaira state.
This map was produced using data from the NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar) satellite and processed by the NISAR science team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Scientists used a technique called InSAR, which compares data from repeat passes to detect subtle changes in the distance between the satellite and the ground. Images acquired on June 25 and June 30, after the quakes, were compared with images from June 13 and June 18, before the quakes.
NISAR views Earth at an angle, about 40 degrees from straight down, allowing it to capture a mix of horizontal and vertical displacement. In this map, red areas show where the ground moved east and up; blue areas moved west and down. Because the earthquake occurred on a strike-slip fault, however, most of the displacement shown in this map was horizontal (east and west).
White areas indicate little to no land displacement, including a thin strip near the middle-left of the scene, close to Morón, marking roughly where the fault ruptured at depth. The fault is part of a network of fractures that lies along the boundary between the Caribbean plate to the north and the South American plate to the south. Scientists say faults along this plate boundary, including the San Sebastián fault system where these quakes likely occurred (and possibly part of the Boconó system), have long been accumulating strain.
The fault rupture propagated offshore, toward the east, and then back onshore near the international airport north of Caracas, marked by the narrow white band visible between westward and eastward displacement. Just south of this fault section, the deep blue color indicates that the westward surface displacement along this part of the fault was far greater than elsewhere, reaching as much as 60 centimeters (24 inches).
“These are reasons why the damage in Caracas and La Guaira was so extreme,” said Eric Fielding, a geophysicist at JPL who provided the maps. “InSAR tells us a lot about what happened during this earthquake.”
Using the NISAR data, the U.S. Geological Survey refined its fault-slip model, or “finite fault model,” to better constrain how the fault slipped at depth, including along the rupture’s eastern section. “That is extremely helpful for the people who need to understand why damage was so severe in that area,” Fielding said.
The displacement maps for this event were provided through NISAR’s Urgent Response (UR) system, a fast-track process that can deliver data within 12 to 24 hours to support disaster response. The rapid processing relies on predicted orbit information, so UR maps are preliminary until they are later reprocessed with precise orbit information, typically within a day or two. This marks the first time the NISAR UR system has been used to map surface displacement from a large earthquake.
NASA Earth Observatory map by Lauren Dauphin, using data provided Eric Fielding and processed by the NISAR science team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Story by Kathryn Hansen.
Downloads
June 25 & June 30, 2026
JPEG (3.51 MB)
References & Resources
NASA (2025, July 23) Interferometry. Accessed July 9, 2026.
NASA astronaut Anil Menon and Roscosmos cosmonauts Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina, Soyuz MS-29 prime crew members, pose for a portrait at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Russia.
Credit: GCTC
NASA astronaut Anil Menon will launch aboard the Roscosmos Soyuz MS-29 spacecraft to the International Space Station on Tuesday, July 14, accompanied by cosmonauts Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina, where they will join the Expedition 74 crew advancing scientific research.
Menon, Dubrov, and Kikina will lift off at 10:47 a.m. EDT (7:47 p.m. Baikonur time) from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Live launch and docking coverage is available on NASA+, Amazon Prime, and the agency’s YouTube channel. Learn how to watch NASA content through a variety of online platforms, including social media.
After a two-orbit, three-hour trip to the station, the spacecraft will automatically dock at 1:56 p.m. to the Prichal module. Shortly afterward, hatches will open between the Soyuz and the orbiting laboratory.
Once aboard, the trio will join NASA astronauts Jessica Meir, Jack Hathaway, and Chris Williams, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov, Sergei Mikaev, and Andrey Fedyaev.
NASA’s coverage schedule is as follows (all times Eastern and subject to change based on real-time operations):
Menon, Dubrov, and Kikina will spend about eight months aboard the orbital complex as International Space Station Expedition 74/75 crew members before returning to Earth in April 2027. This will be Menon’s first spaceflight and the second for both Dubrov and Kikina.
During his stay on the station, Menon will conduct scientific research and technology demonstrations aimed at advancing human space exploration and benefiting life on Earth. He will continue research to refine in-space production of semiconductor crystals to enable the large-scale manufacturing of components needed for high-performance computers, artificial intelligence, and improved medical devices. Menon also will perform ultrasoundusing augmented reality and artificial intelligence methods that could eliminate the need for medical support from Earth on future space missions. He will be a test subject helping researchers understand how blood flow is affected in space to protect future astronauts. He also will test bioprinting vascular constructs in microgravity to improve understanding of the aging process to advance therapeutic developments.
For more than 25 years, people have lived and worked continuously aboard the International Space Station, advancing scientific knowledge and making research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. The space station helps NASA understand and overcome the challenges of human spaceflight, expand commercial opportunities in low Earth orbit, and build on the foundation for long-duration missions to the Moon, as part of the Artemis program, and to Mars.
To learn more about International Space Station research, operations, and its crews, visit:
NASA Space Telescope Maps Magnetic Fields of ‘Lighthouse’ Pulsar
For the first time, scientists have used NASA’s IXPE (Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer) to directly measure the magnetic fields of PSR J1101−6101, a pulsar located within what is often referred to as the Lighthouse Nebula. The results provide new insight into the structure of some of the most extreme objects in the cosmos, as NASA continues to explore the secrets of how the universe works. A paper describing the results published Thursday in the Astrophysical Journal.
Scientists have successfully measured the magnetic field of the Lighthouse pulsar’s nebula using NASA’s IXPE. Their measurements confirm the theory that high-energy particles escape along the galaxy’s magnetic field lines. This composite image contains X-ray data from IXPE in blue (highlighted in the inset), the Chandra X-ray Observatory in purple, and radio data from CSIRO in green. The starfield is optical data from the 2MASS optical survey.
X-ray: Chandra: NASA/CXC/Stanford Univ./J.T. Dinsmore et al.; IXPE: NASA/MSFC/J.T. Dinsmore et al., Radio: CSIRO/ATNF/ATCA; Optical: 2MASS/UMass/IPAC-Caltech/NASA/NSF; Image processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/L. Frattare
Fast facts
A pulsar is a type of neutron star with a strong magnetic field that spins incredibly fast. The pulsar at the center of the Lighthouse Nebula is rotating 16 times per second.
Neutron stars are the leftover cores of massive stars, formed at the end of their life cycles, that possess more mass than the Sun. They are condensed down to the size of a city, making them natural laboratories for studying extreme physics.
Polarization is a property of light that describes the direction of its electric field vibrations. The polarization degree is a measurement of how aligned those vibrations are with each other.
In June 2025, IXPE spent nearly 18 days focused on the Lighthouse Nebula.
Astronomers studied two narrow X-ray offshoots extending from the pulsar to better understand how electrons at nearly the speed of light interact with this energetic system. The longer offshoot is known as the “filament,” and the shorter one is the “trail.”
When high-energy particles from the pulsar collide with the gas of interstellar space, they form a bow shock, like the bow wave formed at the front of a speeding boat. Most particles become trapped behind this bow shock, forming the turbulent trail behind the pulsar.
Researchers have suspected since 2008 that the highest-energy particles escape through this bow shock into interstellar space, flowing along the galaxy’s magnetic field lines to create the nebula’s long, thin filament.
“We wanted to test that theory,” said Jack Dinsmore, undergraduate student at Stanford University, who led the study. “The ‘smoking gun’ would come by measuring the polarization of the light, which indicates the magnetic field direction. If the magnetic field points along the filament, that confirms that the filament’s particles are flowing along the field.”
One challenge with these measurements is that the Lighthouse Nebula is relatively faint. To address this, IXPE scientists developed advanced analysis methods that use every bit of data, avoiding simplifying steps that could limit information. With these new tools and the new observations of the Lighthouse, the science team successfully measured the filament’s polarization. These techniques also gave a polarization measurement of the trail, and the pulsar’s emission signal.
Their analysis confirmed with more than 99% confidence that the magnetic field does indeed align with the particles’ flow.
While the parallel direction confirms models for the particle’s motion, the polarization degree was high enough to raise new questions.
“Many of the models for filaments assume strong magnetic turbulence,” said Roger Romani, a Stanford University professor who co-authored this paper. “The high polarization degree we measured indicates lower turbulence than such models require.”
The IXPE observations also showed that the magnetic field responsible for X-ray emission had to be parallel to the trail. However, the authors collected radio frequency observations showing a magnetic field pointing almost exactly perpendicular.
“The striking divergence in magnetic field orientations observed between radio and X-ray wavelengths provides compelling evidence for the highly structured nature of these objects,” said Niccolò Bucciantini of the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics and co-author of the study. “This marks the first clear indication that particles of different energies occupy distinct regions within the system, hinting at the presence of multiple, and potentially very different, acceleration mechanisms at work.”
More about IXPE
The IXPE mission, which continues to provide unprecedented data enabling groundbreaking discoveries about celestial objects across the universe, is a joint NASA and Italian Space Agency mission with partners and science collaborators in 12 countries. It is led by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, and BAE Systems, Inc. manages spacecraft operations together with the University of Colorado’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder.
Two new reports from NASA’s Commercial Satellite Data Acquisition (CSDA) program evaluate data from the Umbra X-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite constellation for the NASA Earth science research and applications community. The results of these evaluations help to inform NASA program management and the user community about the quality of these commercial data for use in NASA science.
NASA’s CSDA program released the Umbra SAR Principal Investigator Evaluation Summary and Umbra SAR Quality Assessment Reports in May 2026. (The cover of the Quality Assessment Report is shown at left.) The results of these evaluations help inform NASA program management about the quality of this commercial data for use in NASA science. At right, a collage of synthetic aperture radar images from Umbra.
TheCSDA Umbra Synthetic Aperture Radar Umbra SAR Principal Investigator Evaluation Summary documents the findings of evaluation teams. The teams were given access to the Umbra archive as well as the ability to task the Umbra constellation for new acquisitions. The tasking capability allowed evaluation teams to test the utility of Umbra data in time-sensitive workflows and to monitor areas experiencing rapid change and/or emergent environmental conditions, such as harmful algal blooms.
Although the Principal Investigator Evaluation Summary supports the use of Umbra SAR data for NASA Earth science research and applications overall, it noted several strengths and weaknesses of the Umbra X-band data. Strengths included access to a very high spatial resolution X-band SAR satellite constellation; taskable access to high temporal repeat opportunities with quick turnaround; imaging flexibility with a range of azimuth and incidence angles; and the company’s Open Data Program. Conversely, the PI teams reported weaknesses, including issues with Umbra geolocation (noting large and small geolocation errors), limited software compatibility, metadata, and some missing technical documentation.
Additionally, theCSDA Umbra Synthetic Aperture Radar Umbra SAR Quality Assessment Report documents the results of radiometric and geometric analyses performed by NASA subject matter experts (SMEs) enlisted to evaluate the fundamental quality of the Umbra data following the Joint NASA/European Space Agency (ESA) assessment guidelines (ESA-NASA, 2024).
Performed mainly on the single-look complex (SLC) Level 1 data products in Sensor Independent Complex Data (SICD) format, along with some additional Level 2 products used in science usability assessments by the evaluation team, the CSDA SMEs found the spatial resolution of the data agreed with Umbra’s specifications. However, the quality analysis results for geolocation accuracy did not universally align with the company’s specifications. Given these results, the SME’s concluded that “the overall positioning performance of the Umbra data did not meet the expected accuracy.
Regarding the radiometric performance of the data, which was assessed in terms of absolute accuracy, stability, and sensitivity, the SMEs found the data “underperform[ed] relative to that of well-calibrated reference SAR systems.”
About the CSDA Program
The CSDA program was established to identify, evaluate, and acquire data from commercial sources that support the NASA Earth science research and application goals. NASA’s Earth Science Division recognizes the potential impact commercial satellite constellations may have in encouraging/enabling efficient approaches to advancing Earth System Science and applications development for societal benefit. Commercially acquired data may also provide a cost-effective means to augment and/or complement the suite of Earth observations acquired by NASA, other U.S. government agencies, and international partners.
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
These four views were captured from a World War II-era aircraft in April 2026, when scientists used instruments aboard the plane to study Arctic sea ice. Their flights were timed to coincide with satellites passing overhead so the airborne and orbital data could be combined.
NASA/JPL-Caltech
This month, engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California are testing a spacecraft sensor that will help measure how quickly Arctic sea ice is disappearing. And while that instrument won’t launch for another year, scientists started preparing for its use during a recent field campaign in the Canadian wilderness.
Researchers spent two weeks in April flying above the Arctic Ocean, often watching sunrise from an altitude of 1,500 feet (457 meters) in a World War II-era plane. A variety of cutting-edge sensors used to measure the thickness of sea ice and snow were aboard the plane, including a stand-in for the microwave radiometer now undergoing testing at JPL. Measuring sea ice thickness is tricky, requiring a number of precise figures, including how high the sea ice rises above water, the depth of snow on top of that ice, and microwave emissions from the surface.
Flights were timed to the passage of satellites overhead so coordinated observations could be taken of the same features. Combining the airborne and satellite data will improve scientists’ ability to measure sea ice and understand how climate conditions are evolving across the Arctic.
In recent decades, the extent and thickness of Arctic sea ice have changed. Improving measurements of those changes helps scientists better understand the Arctic system while supporting navigation, weather and ocean research, and future satellite observations. As Arctic shipping activity increases, the region is also becoming strategically and economically more significant.
According to Sahra Kacimi of JPL, who served as the field campaign’s science lead, ongoing warming in the Arctic could potentially impact public safety and economic interests.
Find out what Arctic sea ice looked like as scientists studied it from the air — and using space-based instruments — during a field campaign this past April. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Frequent flyers
Kacimi has spent years studying sea ice using satellite data, but the top-down view she gets from space is different than peering out a plane’s window.
The bewildering diversity of sea ice creates otherworldly landscapes. The ice can be attached to land or adrift in the ocean; it can be rough or smooth. Driven by winds and ocean currents, the ice is constantly shifting, breaking apart, and deforming. Cracks can open into long stretches of exposed ocean, and collisions between floes can push ice rubble into massive ridges that extend for miles.
Some sea ice lasts only one season, while thicker ice can survive for several years (though multiyear sea ice is becoming less common in many parts of the Arctic). Entire ecosystems are affected by these changes, down to the arctic foxes and hares the scientists spotted throughout the trip.
Improving estimates of sea ice thickness helps scientists better understand how the region is changing and supports long-term observations of the Arctic environment. The NASA team logged about 50 hours in the air over the two-week campaign, conducting flights over drifting ice near the town of Inuvik before studying ice fixed to the shore of another location, a hamlet called Cambridge Bay.
For the Inuvik portion of the campaign, the team coordinated with the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission, a satellite jointly developed by NASA and the French space agency, CNES (Centre National d’Études Spatiales), with JPL leading the United States component of the mission. Though it was designed to map the height of the globe’s sea and fresh water, SWOT can also measure the amount of sea ice above the waterline.
In Cambridge Bay, the NASA team joined researchers from ESA (European Space Agency), Germany’s Alfred Wegener Institute, and Canada’s University of Calgary. During this part of the campaign, coordinated flights soared over a field camp and under the tracks of satellite missions such as NASA’s Ice, Cloud, and Land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) and ESA’s CryoSat-2.
To improve sea ice thickness estimates, ESA is developing, with cooperation from NASA, a new polar mission called Copernicus Polar Ice and Snow Topography Altimeter (CRISTAL). During the April airborne campaign, scientists flew instruments similar to what CRISTAL will carry, including the microwave radiometer now being tested at JPL.
“Combining observations from space, air, and ground surface instruments is essential for developing and validating algorithms for current and future missions,” Kacimi said.
For the scientists, it was also a chance to meet locals who see the Arctic’s changes up close. Kacimi spoke to community leaders and students at a STEM camp about how disappearing ice is affecting their communities.
“I’m used to looking at sea ice from space and thinking about its role in the global climate, but for people living in the Arctic, it carries a much deeper meaning,” Kacimi said.
NASA Awards Contracts for Mars Advanced Surface Mobility Technology
July 8, 2026
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NASA Awards Contracts for Mars Advanced Surface Mobility Technology
NASA has selected seven companies for contract awards under the Mars Exploration Program’s Science Transport and Robotic Innovation for Deployment and Exploration, or STRIDE, initiative to advance next-generation commercial robotic surface mobility for future Mars exploration.
The STRIDE awards will support the development of innovative robotic mobility systems that may enable future Mars missions to access more challenging terrain, travel greater distances, and investigate scientifically valuable regions that are difficult to reach with current mobility systems.
The STRIDE awards have a total potential value of approximately $17 million with a period of work targeted to begin in Fall of 2026.
Contract awardees are:
AeroVironment, Arlington, Virginia
Astrobotic, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Venturi Astrolab (Astrolab), Hawthorne, California
Ground Control Robotics, Atlanta, Georgia
Honeybee Robotics, Longmont, Colorado
Intuitive Machines, Houston, Texas
MEI Technologies, Webster, Texas
STRIDE demonstrates NASA’s commitment to strong public-private partnerships, allowing the agency to explore new approaches for Mars surface exploration while identifying key capability gaps and development needs for commercial systems that could operate and traverse realistic Martian environments.
For more information about NASA’s Mars Exploration, visit:
Students Connect NASA Science With Indigenous Knowledge to Study Coastal Erosion
Story by Keri Moskowitz, Gulf of Maine Research Institute
Students return from fieldwork and sit together in the classroom, examining NASA satellite images to learn about the changes to their community’s coastline.
For the Pleasant Point Passamaquoddy Reservation, or Sipayik, the ocean has always been a teacher. Situated in what is known as Downeast Maine, along the shores of Passamaquoddy Bay, generations of Indigenous people have lived along the coast, learning from the tides, the land, and their elders. But today, the shoreline is changing more rapidly. Coastal erosion is slowly taking land away. Land that already holds a history of loss.
In the summer of 2023, inspired by a trip to Fairbanks, AK to attend Climate Change in My Community – a workshop organized by the NASA Science Activation (SciAct) program’s Arctic and Earth Signs project – SciAct’s Learning Ecosystems Northeast (LENE) team began working with partners, including Indigenous leaders and scientists, to ask an important question: What does coastal erosion mean to people who have already lost land?
By November 2024, planning was underway at Sipayik Elementary School. The goal was to bring together Western science and Indigenous knowledge so students could understand the changes happening in their own community.
The lessons began in March 2025. For five weeks, nine 5th-grade students explored erosion in many ways. They visited local field sites and listened to elders share stories about how the coastline used to look. Learners used these accounts to measure the changes, both on the coast and via maps back in the classroom. They built erosion trays from simple materials to test how waves shape the land. They measured current high tide lines and compared them to historical ones. They studied old photographs and aerial images from 1942 to 2023 to see how much the shoreline had moved. They even compared 300-year-old tribal maps with future flood projections.
Students learned that science does not only live in textbooks. As one observer shared, “Our people were scientists without having to go to school.”
The students were curious, engaged, and proud. They saw that resilience is part of who they are. They have always adapted while holding on to culture.
In June of 2026, the students were invited to the Gulf of Maine Research Institute to present their work to scientists, staff, and REU (Research Experience for Undergraduate) interns. They traveled 3.5 hours for this opportunity, and the journey proved worthwhile. During the Q&A portion following their slideshow, someone asked whether learning to read the various maps was difficult. One student responded with a reminder: these were not merely maps but NASA satellite images.
Future goals for the project include inviting more elders and adding more field sites in the work, strengthening language and cultural connections, sharing student learning with other Native youth, and planning resilience strategies like marsh restoration in coordination with tribal leadership. When the students were asked if they planned to continue their studies and work on this cause after their time in the classroom ended, they all resoundingly stated “YES”.
In Sipayik, the story of erosion is not just about land washing away. It is about memory, knowledge, identity, and the strength of a community that continues to learn from the shore.
