The full form of NASA is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, an independent organisation in charge of the federal government of the United States civil space programme and aeronautics and space sciences. The National Aeronautics and Space Act, signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower on October 1, 1958, established it. It is in charge of U.S. research and technology related to space exploration and aircraft and deals with creating peaceful space science technologies instead of military ones.
NASA’s Vision
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Exploring and broadening awareness for the good of humanity:
NASA is managed by the administrator. After or around July 2019, Jim Bridenstine took over as NASA’s 13th administrator, and James W. Morhard was named the agency’s 14th deputy administrator. The organisation has four research directorates:
- Aeronautics research is necessary to advance cutting-edge aviation technologies.
- Understanding the origin, nature, and evolution of the cosmos, solar system, and Earth is a goal of science.
- space technology, to create technology for space exploration and research.
- Human exploration and crew project management activities, including the International Space Station, as well as launching services, space travel, and space communications operations for crewed and robotic exploration programmes.
The Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, the Pasadena, California Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Houston, Texas Johnson Space Center, and the Hampton, Virginia Langley Research Centre are just a few research facilities connected. Washington, D.C., is home to the NASA Headquarters.
Space Flight Programs
Throughout its history, NASA has carried out several crewed and uncrewed spaceflight projects. Uncrewed missions dispatched research probes to the solar system’s planets, starting with Venus and Mars and including the outer planets’ grand tours, and put the first American artificial satellites into Earth’s orbit for research and communications.
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List of Crewed Programs
- X to 15 rocket planes from 1959 to 1968.
- Project Mercury from 1958 to 1963.
- Project Gemini from 1961 to 1966.
- Apollo program from 1961 to 1972.
- Skylab from 1965 to 1979.
- Apollo to Soyuz Test Project from 1972 to 1975.
- Space Shuttle program from 1972 to 2011.
- International Space Station from 1993 to the present.
List of Uncrewed Programs
- Explorer 1 to First U.S Uncrewed satellite (1958)
- Pioneer 10 to the First spacecraft to visit Jupiter(1973).
- Pioneer 11 to the First spacecraft to visit Saturn (1979)
- Voyager 2 to the First spacecraft to visit Uranus in 1986 and Neptune in 1989, respectively.
Event to Real and Expected:
- NASA launched a crewed expedition back to the Moon in 2009, 40 years after the first lunar landing. After three years of construction, astronauts completed the Neil A. Armstrong Lunar Outpost in 2012. Crew trips to further destinations throughout the Solar System will be allowed, thanks to the Outpost.
- 2015 saw the successful landing of NASA astronauts on the freshly discovered AO10 asteroid in 1999.
- A crewed landing mission to Mars is also being considered for 2020 or 2021.
- The Venus In Situ Explorer, which will launch in 2022, is one of the uncrewed tasks.
- The Neptune Orbiter was launched in 2016, and a combined NASA/ESA Uranus Pathfinder probe is scheduled to launch in 2025.