SpaceX launches a NASA astrophysics mission into Earth’s orbit, as Elon Musk’s private space agency was chosen to launch the SPHEREx mission, as demonstrated by NASA.
A 178-kilogram probe will travel into space and then aboard the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, which they want to launch in early June 2024 from the Space Launch Complex 4E launch station at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. NASA’s Launch Services Program will manage the launch at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
However, agency officials said in a statement that NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory remains responsible for overall project management, system design, integration, testing, and mission assignment. Telecommunications.
SPHEREx is a space observatory and the newest medium-range vehicle in NASA’s astrophysics program. NASA is exploring Earth’s ionosphere with another mid-range vehicle in this series of missions, TESS and ICON. That is, in our planet’s atmosphere, the region where Earth’s weather meets space weather.
The SPHEREx probe will participate in a two-year near-infrared sky survey, which will include a full survey every six months.
