Signal Acquired NASA SPHEREx Begins Science Mission
by Clarence Oxford
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Mar 13, 2025

NASA's SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer) mission has successfully established communication with ground controllers, confirming that the spacecraft is fully operational and generating power as expected.

In the coming weeks, mission specialists will ready the observatory for its scientific survey by performing instrument calibrations, ensuring the telescope reaches its optimal operating temperature, and assessing its optical capabilities in space.

Over its planned two-year mission, SPHEREx will collect vast amounts of data, surveying over 450 million galaxies and more than 100 million stars in the Milky Way. This effort will advance NASA's scientific objectives of uncovering cosmic origins and investigating the potential for life beyond Earth.

The mission's comprehensive 3D all-sky map aims to address fundamental questions about the universe. SPHEREx will probe cosmic inflation, the rapid expansion that occurred fractions of a second after the big bang. It will also quantify the diffuse glow from distant galaxies, including those previously undetected, and map hidden reservoirs of vital compounds such as water and carbon dioxide within the Milky Way.

SPHEREx's wide-field observational capabilities complement those of targeted space telescopes like Hubble and James Webb. The mission's vast dataset will be made available to researchers worldwide, offering an unprecedented resource for studying hundreds of millions of celestial objects.

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