2025/07/09 by Drew M. Miles, Miles, Drew M.
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Astro and Planetary Science #FOS: Physical sciences #Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics (astro-ph.IM) #Spacecraft Dynamics and Control #Spacecraft and Cryogenic Technologies
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2507.07289
openalex publication_date 2025/07/09 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
The NASA Great Observatories Maturation Program is a development plan to efficiently and effectively develop large, strategic astrophysics missions. Suborbital rocket and balloon programs have long been a key development tool for enabling large missions in NASA astrophysics. We review the significance of these suborbital missions in the preceding decades to demonstrate their contributions to the Great Observatories Maturation Program for the Habitable Worlds Observatory and beyond. We show that suborbital instruments have obtained new science observations of astrophysical sources across the electromagnetic spectrum, matured high-priority component technologies, and served as a training ground for principal investigators of Explorer-class astrophysics satellites. A brief discussion of emerging CubeSat and SmallSat missions and their place in the NASA astrophysics portfolio is also provided.