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Back to work to save science funding! All you need to know about the FY2027 Budget Request The president’s budget requests for NASA and the NSF were released last week. We summarizes the major cuts and their impacts while providing resources to help fight back against this attack on science...

From Tori Bonidie and Skylar Grayson: The president’s budget requests for NASA and the NSF were released last week. We summarizes the major cuts and their impacts while providing resources to help fight back against this attack on science. ⚛️ 🔭 ☄️ 🧪
astrobites.org/2026/04/16/budget-request-fy2027/

Cover of report "Mission Aborted: how NASA illegally implemented the president's budget request without congressional approval. Minority staff report, prepared by members of the committee on science, space, and technology, us house of representatives, April 2026

This report came out today by minority staff of the House science committee on how three NASA missions were aborted due to NASA illegally following the FY26 president's budget request instead of congressionally approved budget. Very important reading. 🔭🧪 democrats-science.house.gov/staff-report...

Physics bachelors programs at Bowling Green, Kent State, Ohio U, and Wright State will be eliminated! ⚛️🧪🔭

A black, single-layer cake. The top is decorated with a pastel-rainbow telescope and galaxy map behind it.

A different view of the cake, showing the galaxy map spilling over the side.

DESI finished its originally planned survey last night!! ..and will keep going :)

I made a cake to celebrate. 🌌🔭
@desisurvey.bsky.social

I study racism for a living and can still manage to be shocked by how institutionalized it is. What do you mean they were giving tax-breaks to white supremacists celebrating treason?

just a wild country

NASA FINESST announced, due July 14! Does not include astro or planetary science yet, but it says "NOTICE: Applicants to Astro ^ Planetary may not be able to create proposals on the day of release but please be patient while we get everything set up for you." 🔭 nspires.nasaprs.com/external/sol...

From Deana, the six Lamat alums are Olivia Jackson, Ayanna Mann, Isabelle Connor, Aarna Garg, Kaylee Barrera, Phoenix-Avery Sarian!!! 🎉🎉🎉

NSF Grad Research Fellowship awardees were announced, & the total awards are back up to 2,599 this year after only 1,500 (1000 initially+500 later) last year! Congrats to all awardees, including 3 OSU astro undergrads and 6 UCSC Lamat REU participants!! 🎈🎉🔭🧪 www.research.gov/grfp/Awardee...

It's really not difficult to trace all of the problems in America right now to racism.

We have one of these at Ohio State (and disclosure, I’m tenured there but departing next month). The Center is paying kids to enroll in their courses because the demand is so low.

Opinion | Beware conservatives promoting “intellectual freedom” Victor Ray: This conservative lie about schools like mine is furthering authoritarianism

Making tenure count, for MSNOW I wrote about my employer, The University of Iowa, creating a center for intellectual freedom. It's a reactionary project built on decades of conservative propaganda about higher ed.

Outstanding itemization of how the FY27 budget request for NASA, NSF, and DOE impacts astronomy by the @aas.org Policy Team, Colin Hamill and Roohi Dalal 🔭🧪: aas.org/posts/news/2...

Budget requests typically itemize major changes, but the FY27 request totally omits the names of cancelled missions (& doesn't compare to current budget or previous requests, another standard). It requires careful reading/knowledge to identify what's missing, such as 10 astrophysics missions! 🔭🧪

Ramaswamy wants to consolidate Ohio’s universities. Ohio’s founders would be appalled. • Ohio Capital Journal Vivek Ramaswamy says Ohio has too many universities. Ohio’s public universities weren’t built to compete with each other or with private institutions. They were built to serve different regions,…

Commentary: Vivek Ramaswamy says Ohio has too many universities. Ohio’s public universities weren’t built to compete with each other or with private institutions. They were built to serve different regions, populations, and economic needs ohiocapitaljournal.com/2026/04/09/r...

Apropros of academics losing their visas over nothing, it is great that they can gain legal victories, but I wonder how much her career, her research, her life were impacted in the >1 year that her visa was revoked.

4x4” acrylic painting of Nutella floating across the Orion capsule. It is done in a loose style a bit different from my normal work

SPACE NUTELLA

New over here so introducing myself with some commentary on Artemis II!

The #Artemis II crew has just been given their upcoming distance of closest approach to the Moon as 4067 statute miles and they replied jokingly that they would prefer the number in kilometers and parsecs.

Astronauts... they're just like us [astronomers] ! 🥲

Half of my 🚀 feed is "that's not what the moon looks like" (tidal locking ftw) and the other half 🚀 are like "omg look at that Nutella float!", and I love all of it. 😍

Yeah, I cried at the Carroll crater. 😭

Hey, I wrote a thing about AI in astrophysics
ergosphere.blog/posts/the-ma...

Screenshot of "other missions and data analysis" listing spherex, pioneers, case, swift, NuSTAR, tess, and IXPE.

I did see TESS, NuSTAR, Swift, IXPE, and XMM.

Here is the link for the detailed FY27 NASA president's budget requests. My quick search of astrophysics missions shows ~similar cuts as the FY26 PRB but with no zero mentions of the Chandra, XRISM, or Fermi telescopes. 🔭 www.nasa.gov/fiscal-year-...

I feel like every week, I decide "I'm ready to die on this hill" about some new nonsense that comes our way. Then I don't die, and I move to the next hill. Anyway, happy to have all your company on these hills.

From the 2027 OMB Budget Request page 68 related to NASA science cuts: Program Cuts and Eliminations. Science (-$3.4 billion). The budget terminates over 40 low-priority missions to transform the Science program into one that is more focused and fiscally responsible. Examples of wasteful, terminated spending include: -the grossly over-budget Mars sample return mission, which an independent review team concluded would likely cost $8 billion to $11 billion and whose goals would be achieved by human missions to Mars; and -the SERVIR program, a $10 million per year partnership with the US Agency for International Development that imposed climate extremism on developing countries. Full PDF: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/budget_fy2027.pdf

The OMB budget request (www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/u...) wants to reduce NASA's science budget by $3.4 billion by terminating over 40 "low-priority missions". Does anyone know which 40 missions those are? I can't find them listed anywhere. 🔭🚀

NASA's Artemis 2 pilot Victor Glover listens to 'Whitey on the Moon' every Monday. This is why. "It ain't about racism. It's about the human condition."

A few people have replied to my Artemis posts with links to Gil Scott-Heron's "Whitey on the Moon." Here's a story from Space.com about Artemis II pilot Victor Glover, currently en route to fly around the Moon, and his connection to that piece. www.space.com/space-explor...

Among the firsts of Artemis II, it will be the first time a person of color and Black astronaut (Victor Glover), first woman astronaut (Christina Koch), and first Canadian and non-US citizen astronaut (Jeremy Hansen) travel beyond low Earth orbit and to the Moon. 🚀

Moon Formation - NASA Science Earth’s Moon was born out of destruction. There are several theories about our Moon’s formation, but almost all share that point in common...

I think the Moon's formation is amazing! I feel like we take for granted that the Moon is close to Earth and so big, but it is wild that it likely came from a collision with a Mars-sized body early in our Solar System. 🔭🌕 science.nasa.gov/moon/formati...

All the news today caused the major outlets to forget that we are taking the first human flight to the moon tomorrow in >50 years! I think about all the wonder & inspiration that came from the Apollo and Voyager missions & how we are missing that now bc of all the terrible things happening. 🔭🚀