NASA’s Psyche Mission Images Details of Martian Surface During Flyby
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Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU
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NASA’s Psyche Mission Images Details of Martian Surface During Flyby
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Captured by the multispectral imager instrument on NASA’s Psyche mission, this is an enhanced-color mosaic created from four individual images acquired on May 15, 2026, during the spacecraft’s flyby of Mars.
Psyche was traveling from right to left (northeast to southwest on Mars) during the six minutes that it took to acquire the images for this mosaic, and the pixel scale resolution varies from 381 meters per pixel on the right to 440 meters per pixel on the left. The imager used its near-infrared, green, and blue filters, which helped to reveal highly contrasting craters, ridges, wind streaks, and volcanic plains materials on the surface.
The mosaic covers part of the Iapygia region of the rugged southern highlands of Mars, from approximately 62 degrees east to 78 degrees east longitude and 4 degrees north to 14 degrees south latitude. The largest crater, just below center, is called Fournier and is about 71 miles (114 kilometers) in diameter. The linear feature running from top to bottom of the mosaic just left of center is part of a long irregular cliff (or scarp) system called Oenotria Scopuli, which is part of the circular structure of the large Isidis impact basin to the northeast of this area.
For more information about NASA’s Psyche mission, visit:
The Republic of Mauritius has officially joined the global coalition committed to responsible space exploration, becoming the newest signatory and seventh African country to join the Artemis Accords. NASA’s Deputy Administrator Matt Anderson contributed video remarks for a signing ceremony on Friday, in the island nation’s city of Ébène.
“We are honored to welcome Mauritius to the Artemis Accords community and look forward to working together in the years ahead,” said Anderson. “Together, we are creating the foundation for future exploration while ensuring that space remains peaceful, accessible, and beneficial for all. America will return to the Moon and ignite the Golden Age of exploration and discovery. That work requires capable partners and a shared commitment to responsible exploration.”
Mauritius’ Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Tertiary Education, Science and Research Navindsing Jugmohunsing signed the Artemis Accords on behalf of the country. U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Sarah Troutman and U.S. Chargé d’Affaires to Mauritius Craig Halbmaier were present to witness the signing.
“The accession of Mauritius to the Artemis Accords marks a defining chapter in our New Space journey,” said Jugmohunsing. “As a Small Island Developing State in the Indian Ocean, we are committed to ensuring that space serves humanity by protecting our oceans and coastlines and amplifying the voices of nations like ours. Mauritius stands ready to help shape the future of space governance while unlocking new opportunities for innovation and partnership.”
NASA first engaged with Mauritius through its early global mapping efforts, owing to the nation’s strategic location. Between 1965 and 1980, NASA used several satellite missions to collect global measurements of Earth’s size and shape. As part of that work, NASA sent teams to Mauritius and other international tracking stations that supported satellite photography for geodetic analysis. Their observations strengthened the navigation technologies used from Apollo to Artemis and helped lay the foundation for the partnership reaffirmed today by the Artemis Accords.
In 2020, NASA and the Department of State joined with seven other founding nations to establish the Artemis Accords, responding to the growing interest in lunar activities by both governments and private companies. They introduced the first set of practical principles aimed at enhancing the safety and coordination between like-minded nations as they explore the Moon, Mars, and beyond, committing nations to:
explore peaceably and transparently
render aid to those in need
enable access to scientific data
ensure activities do not interfere with those of others
preserve historically significant sites and artifacts by developing best practices
Five years later, President Donald J. Trump’s National Space Policy directed NASA to establish a sustained lunar outpost. With this Moon Base, NASA is putting the principles of the Artemis Accords into practice, inviting every signatory including now Mauritius to take part in the endeavor.
More countries are expected to sign the Artemis Accords in the months and years ahead, as NASA continues its work to establish a safe, peaceful, and prosperous future in space.
Relatively low tidal waters expose sandflats and mudflats in the Bijagós Archipelago of Guinea-Bissau in this image acquired on November 28, 2025, with the OLI (Operational Land Imager) on Landsat 8. These coastal landforms support an array of invertebrates, making the archipelago a popular stopover for migratory shorebirds.
NASA Earth Observatory/Lauren Dauphin
Twice each day, tides ebb and flow through a maze of sandy channels, mudflats, and mangrove forests that flank the 88 islands and islets of Guinea-Bissau’s Bijagós Archipelago (Arquipélago dos Bijagós in Portuguese). Seen from above, the process leads to stark changes to the landscape: around low tide, intertidal mudflats and sandflats emerge from the sea, causing islands to grow significantly before shrinking again hours later.
The perpetual rhythm of the tides sustains outpourings of marine life in an archipelago that, as of 2025, was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site. The site protects the only active deltaic archipelago on Africa’s Atlantic coast, a place where tides, river sediments, coastal upwelling, and coastal currents come together to shape unusually productive and biodiverse island ecosystems.
UNESCO estimates that the islands support some 870,000 migratory shorebirds, making this one of the most important feeding areas for birds in West Africa along the East Atlantic Flyway. Hundreds of species of birds dine on a potpourri of marine worms, crustaceans, mollusks, and small fish found on mudflats exposed by low tides. During high tides, manatees, dolphins, and schools of fish move closer to the islands, pushing deeper into the mangrove forests that ring them, and tens of thousands of sea turtles swim inland to sandy beaches as they hunt for nesting sites.
A huge population of green sea turtles nests on the tiny island of Poilão, part of the João Vieira and Poilão Marine National Park. After hatching, young turtles make perilous nighttime dashes to the water, often pursued by crabs, lizards, and birds. Once they reach the water, baby sea turtles face an array of predators, including jacks, barracudas, groupers, and snappers that patrol shallow waters as well as tuna, mackerel, sharks, and rays in deeper waters. According to some estimates, less than 1 percent of green sea turtle hatchlings survive to adulthood.
A 2025 analysis of the region’s tides explored why the archipelago has some of the largest tidal ranges in West Africa. The researchers concluded that the region’s wide, shallow shelf and the estuary’s geometry combine to create a tidal range of up to 7 meters (23 feet), compared to about 1 meter (3 feet) in many other parts of the West African coast. The scientists used altimetry data from the NASA/CNES TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason-1, and Jason-2 satellites to help validate their findings.
NASA Earth Observatory images by Lauren Dauphin, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Story by Adam Voiland.
Serbia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Marko Đurić, right, shakes hands with NASA Deputy Administrator Matt Anderson, left, after signing the Artemis Accords Thursday, July 16, at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
NASA/Keegan Barber
The Republic of Serbia signed the Artemis Accords Thursday during a ceremony hosted by NASA at the agency’s Headquarters in Washington, becoming the 69th nation to join a large community of like-minded nations committed to the peaceful, transparent, and responsible exploration of space.
“Serbia’s connection to NASA reaches back to the Apollo program, when the work of Serbian engineers helped make some of humanity’s greatest achievements in space possible,” said NASA Deputy Administrator Matt Anderson. “Among them was Milojko ‘Mike’ Vučelić, who was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for the critical role he played in bringing the Apollo 13 crew safely home. Their story stands as a reminder that the greatest achievements in space are made possible by talented people working together.”
The broader team of Serbian American engineers played key roles during the Apollo era across systems engineering, propulsion, power systems, spacecraft docking, electronics reliability, and mission coordination. Their expertise supported critical functions ranging from lunar landing analysis to safe spacecraft docking.
Serbia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Marko Đurić signed the Artemis Accords on behalf of the country.
“The great beyond has always inspired humanity to achieve its greatest feats — from the Roman ‘per aspera ad astra’ to Norman Vincent Peale’s belief that if we aim for the Moon, we will at least land among the stars,” said Đurić. “Those words feel especially fitting today. We come from a nation of great minds like Nikola Tesla and Milutin Milanković, but also from the legacy of David Vujic, one of the pioneers of the Apollo missions and a member of the ‘Serbian Seven,’ a group of engineers and technicians whose contributions to NASA helped make the Moon landing possible. In that spirit, we owe it to both our brave ancestors and our children to keep pushing toward new frontiers — to explore, to inspire one another, and to dare even greater things.”
By signing the Artemis Accords, nations open the door to opportunities for future lunar exploration with NASA, such as providing science and technology payloads for the U.S.-led Moon Base and CubeSats for upcoming Artemis missions, advancing humanity’s return to the Moon, and shaping the Golden Age of space exploration and innovation.
Ambassador of the Republic of Serbia to the United States Dragan Šutanovac; State Secretary for Serbia’s Ministry of Science, Technological Development and Innovation Marija Gnjatović; and U.S. Department of State Assistant Secretary for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs Wesley Brooks all participated in Serbia’s signing ceremony.
In 2020, NASA and the Department of State joined with seven other founding nations to establish the Artemis Accords, responding to the growing interest in lunar activities by both governments and private companies. They introduced the first set of practical principles aimed at enhancing the safety and coordination between nations as they explore the Moon, Mars, and beyond, committing nations to:
explore peaceably and transparently
render aid to those in need
enable access to scientific data
ensure activities do not interfere with those of others
preserve historically significant sites and artifacts by developing best practices
Five years later, President Donald J. Trump’s National Space Policy directed NASA to establish a sustained lunar outpost. With this Moon Base, NASA is putting the principles of the Artemis Accords into practice, inviting every signatory to take part in the endeavor.
More countries are expected to sign the Artemis Accords in the months and years ahead, as NASA continues its work to establish a safe, peaceful, and prosperous future in space.
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
This artist’s concept depicts a near-Earth asteroid with an elongated orbit. A few objects such as these can exhibit significant perturbations in their motion around the Sun and, like the asteroid 1998 SH2, could turn out to be regular comets with a weak tail and coma (the gas and dust around a comet’s nucleus).
NASA/JPL-Caltech
New research led by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California has revealed the identity of a puzzling near-Earth object by precisely tracking its motion through space and using powerful observatories that image faint celestial objects.
This object has a dual personality: Past images hadn’t revealed obvious cometlike activity, suggesting it might be an asteroid, but its motion recently proved to be irregular like that of a comet. The scientists detailed their findings in a study published in the journal Nature Astronomy.
The puzzle began on Aug. 28, 2025, when the object, provisionally known as the asteroid 1998 SH2, passed safely within 2 million miles (3 million kilometers) of our planet during its 4½-year orbit around the Sun. Researchers looking to observe 1998 SH2 with NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN) planetary radar system had calculated its position using data from previous orbits and factored in the effects that the gravity of the Sun and planets would have on its path. But when 1998 SH2 didn’t show up where they expected, they realized that something unanticipated had been influencing the object’s motion.
Object tracking
By using optical astrometry to precisely measure the object’s position in the sky, the researchers were able to identify the cause.
“After we measured the nongravitational perturbations affecting the motion of 1998 SH2 and recognized they weren’t compatible with the object being an asteroid, we suspected the object could be an active comet,” said Davide Farnocchia, a navigation engineer with NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies at JPL and study lead.
Although 1998 SH2’s orbit around the Sun had been well-tracked from 1998 to 2016, the object had completed two solar orbits without additional observations by telescopes until the 2025 DSN attempts. Analyzing all observations collected since the object’s discovery in 1998, researchers determined the perturbations to 1998 SH2’s motion and hypothesized that the object may be generating a small thrust by venting gas into space, causing it to deviate from its predicted path.
This venting results from the Sun heating ice mixed with rocky material, turning the ice into a gas. With regular comets, this activity forms a trademark bright tail and coma — the gas and dust surrounding a comet’s nucleus. But when an object produces gas and dust in much smaller quantities, its tail and coma may not be detectable to most observatories.
Tail, coma emerge
The August 2025 close approach to Earth of 1998 SH2 provided the perfect opportunity for the paper’s authors to gather observational evidence of visible cometary activity. They reached out to astronomers at the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope, a 3.6-meter (12-foot) optical/infrared telescope near the summit of Mauna Kea, Hawaii, and the 1.5-meter (5-foot) European Southern Observatory’s Danish Telescope in La Silla, Chile, to observe. Astronomers at the powerful European Southern Observatory’s 8.2-meter (27-foot) Very Large Telescope on the Chilean mountain Cerro Paranal also tracked the object.
“The images we collected from these observatories showed a weak but clear tail, thus confirming that 1998 SH2 is, in fact, a comet,” said Olivier Hainaut, an astronomer with the European Southern Observatory and coauthor of the study. “That’s how science works — you form a hypothesis, and you set out to test it. This data is exactly what was needed to confirm our hypothesis that 1998 SH2 was a comet.”
As an outcome of the investigation, 1998 SH2 will receive an additional comet provisional designation, P/1998 SH2.
Planetary defense implications
The research also sheds light on another, even more unusual, class of objects called dark comets. Like 1998 SH2, dark comets exhibit significant irregularities, or perturbations, in their trajectory but lack other visible evidence of comet activity — there’s no coma, tail, or visible outgassing. These enigmatic objects fall into two distinct populations: larger ones with orbits similar to those of Jupiter-family comets (short period comets with highly elliptical, or eccentric, orbits), and smaller ones that orbit closer to the Sun. Since the 2016 discovery of the first dark comet, about a dozen more have been identified.
The paper’s authors suggest that many of the larger dark comets, which have orbits like 1998 SH2’s, could turn out to be regular comets if astronomers get the right opportunity to observe them with powerful telescopes capable of imaging incredibly faint objects. And by analyzing the motion of all near-Earth objects using precision astrometry data, researchers may reveal more comets that were previously designated as asteroids if they exhibit cometlike nongravitational perturbations.
“This work shows the importance of continuously tracking near-Earth objects,” said Farnocchia. “Because of outgassing, the motion of comets is more significantly perturbed than that of asteroids. Detecting these perturbations can be an important diagnostic tool for planetary defense that will help understand which objects may be comets rather than asteroids, how their orbits evolve, and how that influences their Earth impact risks.”
Hunting for near-Earth objects
NASA’s upcoming Near-Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor will collect data that can be used to support this effort. The first space survey telescope to be built for planetary defense, this next-generation mission will seek out some of the hardest-to-find near-Earth objects, such as dark asteroids and comets that don’t reflect much visible light.
NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies, the Goldstone Solar System Radar Group, and NEO Surveyor all are managed by JPL and supported by the agency’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office in Washington. Caltech in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA. The DSN receives programmatic oversight from the SCaN (Space Communications and Navigation) program office, also at NASA headquarters.
More information about planetary radar, NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies, and near-Earth objects can be found at:
Billions of years ago, an hours-long Martian sandstorm blew so intensely that sand ripples began to climb upon one another as they moved across the surface. These layers of sediment eventually hardened into the multilayered rocks seen in this image, which was taken by NASA’s Curiosity rover on Dec. 12, 2024, the 4,391st Martian day, or sol, of the mission.
Scientists believe this is the first evidence of climbing wind ripple strata on the Red Planet. Spotted at a location nicknamed “Jawbone Canyon,” these rocks are a rare time capsule preserving a dramatic wind event early in Martian history. A paper detailing the discovery was featured on the cover of the journal Geology on July 1, 2026.
This orbital map shows the path NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover took to get to a location the science team has dubbed the “Broom Point member,” a sequence of layered bedrock likely more than 3.9 billion years old. As planned, the rover landed inside Jezero Crater on Feb. 18, 2021. It investigated the crater’s western delta and inlet river valley, Neretva Vallis, before summiting the crater rim in December 2024 following a rim-to-crest climb of 2,620 feet (800 meters).
The Broom Point region is situated on the outer edge of the crater rim and was visited by the rover in mid-2025. The yellow dot indicates location where the rover took a selfie.
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is managed for the agency by Caltech in Pasadena, California, built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover. Arizona State University leads the operations of the Mastcam-Z instrument, working in collaboration with Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego, on the design, fabrication, testing, and operation of the cameras, and in collaboration with the Niels Bohr Institute of the University of Copenhagen on the design, fabrication, and testing of the calibration targets.
JPL manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington as part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program portfolio. Lockheed Martin Space in Denver built MRO and supports its operations. The University of Arizona, in Tucson, operates HiRISE, which was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., in Boulder, Colorado.
