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It has been an eventful few weeks since I last wrote to you and I am excited to update you on everything that has been happening.
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Congratulations to the Perseverance team on a successful launch yesterday! We are excited to celebrate with you as we continue on the road to Mars.
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Solar Orbiter has returned its first data, including the closest images ever taken of the Sun! These images are available to the public and I hope you’ll take the opportunity to view these historic observations. We are excited to see what else Solar Orbiter will accomplish.
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In other mission news, Parker Solar Probe completed its third Venus Gravity assist on July 11 and has successfully completed the maneuver that will set it on course for its next Venus Flyby in February 2021. The Parker team performed the maneuver remotely and I commend their efforts to adapt and continue pursuing excellent science.
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I’m pleased to celebrate more community members’ work featured on the cover of a prominent journal. The cover of the July issue of Nature Astronomy features a model from a paper by Merav Opher, Abraham Loeb, James Drake, and Gabor Toth that explores the shape of the heliosphere.
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We have held several public meetings recently. The Heliophysics Advisory Committee met a few weeks ago and had very productive conversations about the division, including the desire for and support of increased diversity efforts. As I have discussed, we are committed to pursuing unity, diversity, and inclusion in this division and at NASA and are continuing to look for new and better opportunities to accomplish that goal.
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Additionally, Associate Administrator Thomas Zurbuchen held a Community Town Hall where the divisions in the Science Mission Directorate provided science updates. You can watch this as well as past town halls here.
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Our communications efforts continue to amplify your work to the public—get up to date at nasa.gov/sunearth. And if you need an imagery break, feel free to lose yourself for a few minutes—or a full hour—in this 10-year video time-lapse of SDO.
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Finally, I would like to welcome David Cheney to the Heliophysics Division as our newest Program Executive. David comes to us from the Naval Research Lab and will be working on Rideshare, among other opportunities. Welcome, David!
It is a privilege to be able to keep in touch with you all and have you as members of our wonderful (and growing!) heliophysics community.
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As always, it's a great time to be a Heliophysicist.
#HelioRocks
Nicky
P.S. If you know of others interested in receiving this email, please direct them here. Thanks!
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