He should submit it to spritacular if he hasn't already!
Explore Observations - Spritacular share.google/jI6lpD8nHqar...
11.03.2026 04:10
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He should submit it to spritacular if he hasn't already!
Explore Observations - Spritacular share.google/jI6lpD8nHqar...
What's also sad is that this is the most interaction I've gotten when I've shared Spritacular & encouraged people to go and see what they are doing. So appreciate the feedback, but we also need more people to help encourage foot traffic to good science when it's shared on posts without AI/less reach
Share this instead
Happy to - that never made it onto my feed.
But if folks go to the spectacular website, they can see real sprites and hopefully get interested in contributing themselves.
Sure - but we need more data, and if folks will start taking real pictures - see the pictures already on spritacular and contribute their own, that would be a huge benefit!
Check out Spritacular for how you can help collect data and improve the science around sprites!
spritacular.org
And there is a great citizen science group working to collect these images (which you can also see from the ground) check out spritacular! spritacular.org
Email from Chris Reynolds to the AXIS Team. Subject is disappointing AXIS news. Text of e-mail reads: Dear AXIS Friends, The AXIS team has received some very disappointing news – we have been informed by NASA HQ that AXIS is not eligible for selection and hence the Concept Study Report (CSR) will not be subjected to the full review process. AXIS represents the scientific aspirations of a large international community. As a member of one of the AXIS science working groups, you deserve a candid explanation from the PI of what happened and why. That is the purpose of this note. NASA’s decision was programmatic and not based on a review of the technology or science; the mission profile described in the submitted CSR was over the allowed budget and schedule. How was such a thing possible? In short, with NASA-GSFC as the AXIS managing center, the mission formulation process was critically compromised by the seismic shifts occurring in NASA and the Federal government. The AXIS study team was hit hard by three unprecedented challenges: NASA’s Deferred Resignation Program (DRP) and the pressure at GSFC to resign/retire created a rapid and uncontrolled loss of over 20 personnel with key expertise during a critical mission formulation period, including the main GSFC Project Manager (Jimmy Marsh) and the X-ray mirror lead (Will Zhang) and many discipline engineers.
GSFC priorities rapidly realigned to the FY2026 President’s Budget Request (PBR) that eliminated the Probe program, further reducing the availability of GSFC engineering and mission formulation personnel (incl. cost analysts and schedulers) over the critical Summer and Fall months. Key work was halted for almost seven weeks when the core GSFC AXIS study team, dominated by NASA civil servants, was furloughed during the government shutdown. NASA HQ’s extension to the CSR submission deadline (from 18-Dec-2025 to 29-Jan-2026) was inadequate compensation for the disruption and lost time. Taken together, these factors disrupted the basic grass-roots costing process (which requires extensive “reach back” to the discipline engineers to assess labor requirements) as well as the cost-design iteration process that is central to the formulation of a cost-capped and schedule-constrained mission. While the mission design was finalized in April, our initial grass-roots costing (which was ~10% over budget) could only be completed in September due to the lack of assigned resources. With the subsequent government shutdown and then “pens down” in early-December forced by the GSFC Executive Review process, there was no opportunity to work through the set of cost/schedule savings that had already been identified by the AXIS team. Ultimately, the GSFC executive council gave AXIS leadership the choice of submitting a CSR with a non-compliant schedule and cost, or not submitting a CSR at all. We of course proceeded with the submission, including a narrative that we understood the path to a cost-compliant profile (that we would have discussed with the review panels during the Site Visit). NASA HQ has ruled this stance to be unacceptable. It is important to stress that NASA’s programmatic decision was before any technical review had been conducted. The decision was NOT due to any concerns about AXIS technology. Indeed, the AXIS Phase A work had major successes with furthering
Indeed, the AXIS Phase A work had major successes with furthering the key technologies. GSFC’s Next Generation X-ray Optics (NGXO) team successfully demonstrated iridium-coated, stress-compensated mirror segments that meet AXIS baseline requirements (i.e. segment-level performance at sub-arcsecond level). NGXO also built the first AXIS demonstrator mirror module, learning critical lessons about mirror alignment, mounting and bonding. On the detector side, MIT quickly moved to fabricate AXIS-like CCDs and, working with our colleagues at Stanford, recently demonstrated that they achieve the required readout rate and spectral resolution. Similarly, NASA’s decision was NOT a judgment of the importance of AXIS science. The AXIS science case was rated excellent in the Step 1 review, and it only became stronger during our Phase A study. The AXIS Community Science Book, which many of you contributed to, is an extremely powerful demonstration of the relevance and importance of high-resolution X-ray observations to all areas of astrophysics. The Science Book is one of the most important legacies of the AXIS Phase A study and, I believe, will help define future mission concepts for many years to come. I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for all of your work on this. AXIS has been a long journey; we started under the leadership of Richard Mushotzky more than nine years ago. During that time, it’s been an enormous privilege to work with amazing people; the AXIS science team, the incredible/brilliant GSFC and Northrop Grumman engineers, and the wider astrophysics community. I am, quite frankly, livid that AXIS ultimately fell victim to the programmatic chaos of 2025. The astronomical community deserves better. I hope that NASA leadership, especially at GSFC and HQ, can have an honest discussion about how to better support and protect programs during extraordinary times.
For now, as a community, we must look forward. There is still one excellent mission under consideration for the Probe program, PRIMA, and we wish them a smooth and speedy path to selection and flight. In X-ray astronomy, the SMEX and MidEX programs represent concrete pathways for focused, high-impact missions, and the scientific case we built for AXIS provides a strong foundation for those concepts. The technologies we advanced in Step 1 and Phase A, particularly the NGXO mirror work and the MIT/Stanford detector demonstrations, can anchor the next generation of proposals. Most importantly, the AXIS Community Science Book, representing more than 500 scientists across, is a living document and a powerful signal to NASA leadership that this community is organized, serious, and not going anywhere. I encourage everyone to use it actively, as a resource for future concept development, for Astro2030 engagement, and for building the next mission that will deliver high angular resolution X-ray imaging to address the fundamental questions about black hole growth, galaxy evolution, and the hot universe that motivated AXIS from the beginning. This community built something remarkable over nine years and that doesn't end here. Thank you again for your support of AXIS over these times. Best Chris and the AXIS leadership team
The @axisprobe.bsky.social team learned that the phase A concept study report of AXIS (the Advanced X-ray Imaging Satellite) will not be reviewed because the lost personnel at NASA Goddard and government shutdown impacted our schedule and budget. 🔭 Here is the PI's e-mail with the explanation.
Everyone give a HUGE congratulations to Naia for finishing her PhD in aerospace engineering! On my last visit to NASA Kennedy for the #ArtemisII rollout, I learned from her about the Super Guppy, and we dove in a little deeper to see what it's all about! Have some fun and laughs with us!
🚨 #AltCitizen Alert:
Chief Shultz advances proposal to limit public comment:
⏳just 10 days for actions requiring an environmental assessment (EA)
⏳just 20 days for actions requiring an environmental impact statement (EIS)
🗣️ Speak up by March 9.
Details on how in quoted post👇
What better day to promote this than #internationalwomensday?
"An atmosphere of that gas would give to our earth a high temperature.."
An alumnus of Emma Willard’s pioneering school, the Troy Female Seminary, was Eunice
Newton Foote who in 1856 published the first ever scientific paper to show atmospheric CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
#InternationalWomensDay
Grant Witness is hiring! We're seeking a full-time data scientist to join our team building data resources to support journalism, litigation, and activism protecting science, public health, and the rule of law. grant-witness.us/apply.html #rstats
The bug equivalent to the reavers in #FireFly
You can also add your name to the statement (ONE DAY LEFT!) at this link: 🔭☄️
Astronomers for Planet Earth are submitting a statement about some of the proposed megaconstellations that would ruin ground-based astronomy to the FCC.
You can read the statement below: 🔭☄️
If you like those, Then I bet you would like what I’ve always thought looked more like space jellyfish and are naturally occurring - Sprits!
spritacular.org/gallery
Great summary of today's Science, Information & Technology Committee hearing (House of Commons) from @astroroyalscot.bsky.social.
It seems pretty clear that there have been serious structural and governance failures at STFC that have led to the current crisis.
Thanks @scifri.bsky.social for having me on to talk about federal research budgets. TLDL: Congress voted to reject the president's big science cuts, but the White House is slow to release those approved funds. 🧪
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/s...
What happens to Gateway? Or the Exploration Upper Stage? What about Mobile Launcher 2? Are some questions left unresolved with the recent Artemis reorganization.
For @proximareport.bsky.social -> proximareport.com/articles/isa...
Yeah, not a great sign that they're just going to be experimenting on trans inmates like this and it's not a big story.
This is amazing.
www.getyourfuckingmoneyback.com
Spring Break is right around the corner! Are you planning a beach trip?
Tides, winds, and waves can lead to dangerous conditions and impact your plans at the beach.
Find your surf forecast: weather.gov/safety/ripcurrent-forecasts
I continue to be fascinated by the phenomenon whereby an expert engages with any of the LLMs on their field of expertise and is instantly horrified by the wrong answers, and then goes on to use it for things they are not experts in as though it won’t be just as bad for those.
“The Captain is Dead” is perhaps the best co-operative board game out there - and perfect for overly competitive types since you need that to maybe survive and win the game.
From the planetary society here's a comparison of Apollo vs Artemis funding in 2025 dollars
share.google/ge8PTrmX48Qz...
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/26/o...
He compared NASA's current budget to the Manhattan project but not to the Apollo budget... Which Apollo wasn't as ambitious as Artemis is hoping to be... No moon base during Apollo, but working towards a sustained lunar presence with Artemis.
Transgender Kansans are receiving letters saying their driver’s licenses must match sex at birth by Thursday
They can either
🔴Refuse & violate the law
🔴Change ID & out themselves everywhere they use it
They are being marked for discrimination. Sound familiar?
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
