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NuSTAR ○̉｜Definition｜1st｜20251119205401-00-⌔
NuSTAR
NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, also named Explorer 93 and SMEX-11) is a NASA space-based X-ray telescope that uses a conical approximation to a Wolter telescope to focus high energy X-rays from astrophysical sources, especially for nuclear spectroscopy, and operates in the range of 3 to 79 keV.1
NuSTAR is the eleventh mission of NASA’s Small Explorer (SMEX-11) satellite program and the first space-based direct-imaging X-ray telescope at energies beyond those of the Chandra X-ray Observatory and XMM-Newton. It was successfully launched on 13 June 2012, having previously been delayed from 21 March 2012 due to software issues with the launch vehicle.23
The mission’s primary scientific goals are to conduct a deep survey for black holes a billion times more massive than the Sun, to investigate how particles are accelerated to very high energy in active galaxies, and to understand how the elements are created in the explosions of massive stars by imaging supernova remnants.
Having completed a two-year primary mission,4 NuSTAR is in its fourteenth year of operation.
Printed 2026-06-28.
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Link to original Footnotes
“About”. NuSTAR. Caltech. Retrieved 15 October 2017. ↩
“Launch of NASA’s NuSTAR Mission Postponed”. NASA. 16 March 2012. Archived from the original on 22 April 2019. Retrieved 15 October 2017. This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain. ↩
“NASA Selects Explorer Mission Proposals for Feasibility Studies (03-353)” (Press release). Archived from the original on 11 November 2020. Retrieved 17 March 2012. This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain. ↩
Presto, Suzanne (13 August 2014). “Black hole bends light, space, time – and NASA’s NuSTAR can see it all unfold”. CNN Business. CNN. Retrieved 28 November 2022. ↩
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