The MESSENGER mission to investigate the planet Mercury -- led by a Carnegie Institution of Washington Principal Investigator and managed by The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory -- has been selected by NASA as a new Discovery mission.
The TIMED spacecraft, designed to conduct a global study of a critical region in Earth's atmosphere, is taking shape at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.
Asteroid 433 Eros is slightly smaller than predicted, with at least two medium-sized craters, a long surface ridge, and a density comparable to the Earth's crust, according to measurements from NASA's Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) spacecraft.
The Auroral Multiscale Midex Mission, a proposal submitted by a team of institutions led by The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, has been selected as one of five candidates for NASA's medium-class Explorer Program.
As reported in the May 28, 1998, cover story of Nature, scientists from The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) have made a surprising discovery that contradicts long-held beliefs about the sun's relationship to the aurora.
The Comet Nucleus (CONTOUR) mission to study comets -- a joint project between The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) and Cornell University -- has been selected by NASA as one of two new Discovery Program flights.
A 25-minute flyby of the asteroid Mathilde by the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) spacecraft took place June 27. This resulted in spectacular images of a dark, crater-battered little world assumed to date from the b eginning of the solar system.
The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), Laurel, Md., has received a Defense Certificate of Recognition for Acquisition Innovation for its achievements in the Transit Navy Navigation Satellite Program. The award was one of two given out in a community of more than 41,000 eligible organizations.
The Midcourse Space Experiment (MSX) -- a Ballistic Missile Defense Organization (BMDO) satellite launched last April to gather data for future space- and ground-based missile defense systems -- has tracked two medium-range missiles, known as Low Cost Launch Vehicles (LCLV). Part of the Combined Experiments Program, these LCLV flights were designed to demonstrate the ability of space-based optical sensors, on MSX, to perform key missile defense functions -- acquisition, tracking and discrimination in the mid-course phase of missile flight -- on realistic targets against realistic backgrounds.
The first experiments of a collaborative U.S./Russian space science program were successfully launched recently aboard two Russian Meteorological MR-12 sounding rockets from Kapustin Yar, near Volgograd, Russia, a test range similar to the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.