The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) is a NASA space science mission that is part of the Small Explorer program (SMEX). NuSTAR is an X-ray observatory, capable of detecting high-energy light from exotic astronomical objects across the Universe.
Scheduled to launch in August 2011, NuSTAR will search out black holes as close as in our own Milky Way Galaxy, and as far as the distant reaches of the Universe. It will investigate supernovae, exploded stars that forge the elements necessary for life. It will also peer deep into the hearts of distant galaxies, looking at torrential jets or beams of matter and energy that pour out of the supermassive black holes which lurk there.
With NuSTAR, scientists will have an unprecedented view of the Universe in "hard" X-rays, radiation with 100,000 times the energy of the light we see with our eyes. This is an energy that is largely unexplored with astronomical observatories, so in many ways NuSTAR will open a new window on the Universe.
