National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

Definition

NASA is an independent agency of the U.S. federal government responsible for civilian space exploration and research since its establishment in 1958.

Analogy

If we think about exploring space as going on an epic adventure into unknown territories like Indiana Jones does in his movies - then NASA is our adventurous archaeologist hero!

Related terms

Apollo Program: A series of human spaceflight missions undertaken by NASA with the goal of landing humans on the Moon.

Space Shuttle Program: NASA's program which officially launched in 1981 with Columbia. It marked a new era of reusable spacecrafts.

Hubble Space Telescope: An observatory launched into orbit by NASA’s space shuttle Discovery in 1990 that has provided some of most detailed images of distant galaxies ever captured.