Spacecraft technicians lower NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array NuSTAR toward the Pegasus fairing separation ring positioned on its workstand.

In processing facility 1555 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, spacecraft technicians lower NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) toward the Pegasus fairing separation ring positioned on its workstand.

A Pegasus XL rocket is being prepared to launch NuSTAR into space in March. Once processing of the rocket and spacecraft are completed at Vandenberg, they will be flown on the Orbital Sciences’ L-1011 carrier aircraft to the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site at the Pacific Ocean’s Kwajalein Atoll for launch. NuSTAR, a high-energy x-ray telescope, will conduct a census for black holes, map radioactive material in young supernovae remnants, and study the origins of cosmic rays and the extreme physics around collapsed stars. For more information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/nustar. Photo credit: NASA/Randy Beaudoin, VAFB