![MESSENGER](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141224_lg.jpg)
Press Release
Dec 24, 2014
Innovative Use of Pressurant Extends MESSENGER’s Mission, Enables Collection of New Data
The MESSENGER spacecraft will soon run literally on fumes. After more than 10 years traveling in space, nearly four of those orbiting Mercury, the spacecraft has expended most of its propellant and was on course to impact the planet’s surface at the end of March 2015. But engineers on the team have devised a way to use the pressurization gas in the spacecraft’s propulsion system to propel MESSENGER for as long as another month, allowing scientists to collect even more data about the planet closest to the Sun.
![Amputee Makes History with APL's Modular Prosthetic Limb](/sites/default/files/2023-02/Cover-Amputee-History-MPL.jpg)
Press Release
Dec 16, 2014
Amputee Makes History with APL’s Modular Prosthetic Limb
A Colorado man made history at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) this summer when he became the first bilateral shoulder-level amputee to wear and simultaneously control two of the Laboratory’s Modular Prosthetic Limbs.
![](/themes/custom/jhu_apl/default_thumbnail.png)
Press Release
Dec 10, 2014
Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory Reports Record Year for Technology Transfer Efforts
The Laboratory launched six start-up companies, filed disclosures for 257 inventions, and recorded 77 agreements to license APL-developed technologies, according to APL’s Office of Technology Transfer.
![Karl Whittenburg (left) and Alice Bowman](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141208_1b_lg.jpg)
Press Release
Dec 8, 2014
On Pluto’s Doorstep, NASA’s New Horizons Spacecraft Awakens for Encounter
After a voyage of nearly nine years and three billion miles — the farthest any space mission has ever traveled to reach its primary target — NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft came out of hibernation on Dec. 6 for its long-awaited 2015 encounter with the Pluto system.
![Cassini radar sees sand dunes on Saturn's giant moon Titan (upper photo) that are sculpted like Namibian sand dunes on Earth (lower photo).](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141208_2_lg.jpg)
Press Release
Dec 8, 2014
New Research Offers Explanation for Titan Sand Dune Mystery
Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, is a peculiar place. Unlike any other moon in our solar system, it has a dense atmosphere.
![Artist's impression of NASA's New Horizons spacecraft](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141113_lg.jpg)
Press Release
Nov 13, 2014
New Horizons Set to Wake Up for Pluto Encounter
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft comes out of hibernation for the last time on Dec. 6. Between now and then, while the Pluto-bound probe enjoys three more weeks of electronic slumber, work on Earth is well under way to prepare the spacecraft for a six-month encounter with the dwarf planet that begins in January.
![Images of the grooves on Vesta from the Dawn spacecraft](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141106_VestaGrooves.jpg)
Press Release
Nov 6, 2014
What ‘Belted’ Asteroid Vesta?
When NASA’s Dawn spacecraft visited the asteroid Vesta in 2011, it showed that deep grooves that circle the asteroid’s equator like a cosmic belt were probably caused by a massive impact on Vesta’s south pole.
![Three images of C/2013 (Comet Siding Spring)](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141027_sid_00.50.153039UT.png)
Press Release
Oct 27, 2014
First Images of a Comet from a Stratospheric Balloon
The comet was 114 million miles from Mars when these images were taken, approximately three weeks before its close encounter with that planet. BOPPS was approximately 127,000 feet above Earth, observing comets, asteroids and stars during its 17-hour flight.
![Infrared images of C/2013 (Comet Siding Spring)](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141024.png)
Press Release
Oct 24, 2014
Image From Mars-Orbiting Spectrometer Shows Comet’s Coma
These two infrared images of C/2013 (Comet Siding Spring) were taken by the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) on Oct. 19, 2014.
![Prokofiev is the largest crater in Mercury’s north polar region to host radar-bright material.](/sites/default/files/2023-02/141015_lg.jpg)
Press Release
Oct 15, 2014
MESSENGER Provides First Optical Images of Ice Near Mercury’s North Pole
NASA’s MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft has provided the first optical images of ice and other frozen volatile materials within permanently shadowed craters near Mercury’s north pole.