new mission NASA LandoltLaunching in 2029, the spacecraft will orbit an artificial star around Earth to improve measurements of stars and planets. This will increase the accuracy of stars’ brightness calculations by more than a factor of ten, help us understand the planets orbiting these stars, and provide insight into dark energy.

landolt mission

NASA has approved a new satellite mission called Landolt, designed to place an artificial star into orbit around Earth. This artificial star will emit light of a precisely known brightness, helping scientists measure the brightness of real stars more accurately. These improved measurements will improve our understanding of stars and the planets that orbit them, including distant supernovae. The $19.5 million mission could also shed light on dark energy, the mysterious force causing the universe to rapidly expand.

Improvements to star measurements

“Even with modern instruments, only a few percent of stars are known to measure their true brightness,” explains David Ciardi, deputy director of the Exoplanet Science Institute (NExScI) at NASA’s Caltech Astronomy Center IPAC. “Landolt will increase these measurements by more than 10 times. Understanding the true brightness of stars will allow us to better understand stars and, perhaps more importantly, to better understand the planets orbiting stars.”

Launch and partnership

The mission, which will launch in 2029, is led by former IPAC scientist and Caltech alumnus Peter Plavchan (BS ’01), who is now an associate professor of physics and astronomy at George Mason University in Virginia.

IPAC will be responsible for archiving mission data and will contribute ground support through Caltech’s Palomar Observatory. Additional partners include the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a world leader in measuring photon emissions, as well as many other universities. Other members of the CalTech team include Jessie Christiansen, NExScI principal scientist and NASA Exoplanet Archive project scientist at NExScI, who helped propose the mission.

A tribute to Arlo Landolt and mission objectives

Named after the late astronomer Arlo Landolt, who compiled widely used star brightness catalogs in 1973, 1982 and 1992 and died in 2022, this mission will launch a light source with a known photon emission rate into the sky. The team will observe the light source or artificial star next to real stars to create new stellar brightness catalogues. The artificial star will orbit 22,236 miles above Earth, long enough to appear as a star to telescopes on the ground. This orbit also allows the satellite to move at the same speed as the Earth’s rotation, keeping it in place over the United States throughout its one-year primary mission.