STScI at the 247th AAS Meeting: January 4–8, 2026
STScI Newsletter
2025 / Volume 42 / Issue 02
About this Article
Claire Blome (cblome[at]stsci.edu)Updated December 30, 2025
The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) will have a limited presence at the 247th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) held January 4 to 8 at the Phoenix Convention Center in Arizona.
STScI enables excellence in astronomical research by optimizing the science from state-of-the-art observational instruments in space. We are the science operations center of the Hubble Space Telescope, and we host the science and operations center for the James Webb Space Telescope. We will play a key role in helping to support the science operations for the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, in formulation for launch in September 2026. STScI also houses the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes (MAST) which is a NASA-funded project to support and provide to the astronomical community a variety of astronomical data archives, and is the data repository for the HST, JWST, Kepler, K2, TESS missions and more.
Throughout the week, members of STScI will be involved in workshops, science and technical presentations, and press conferences. Our exhibit booth and several associated events will highlight the missions we support on behalf of the science community.
This schedule is preliminary and subject to change. Please check the AAS meeting page for updated details.
| Title and Description | Date and Time (MST) | Type | Location |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rocky Worlds DDT ExoPAG 33 Update As part of the NASA Exoplanet Exploration Program Analysis Group (ExoPAG) meeting held prior to AAS 247, Néstor Espinoza will provide a status report about the HST/JWST Rocky Worlds Director's Discretionary Time (DDT) program, including the program’s motivation, strategies and ongoing efforts. |
Sunday, January 4 9:15 to 9:30 a.m. |
Splinter Meeting | Phoenix Convention Center, 301 D |
| Preparing for the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope: Working in the Roman Research Nexus The Roman Research Nexus is a science platform being developed to provide the astronomical community with a cloud-based computing environment for Roman data. This one-day workshop provides an overview of the Nexus along with both directed and independent hands-on training. The workshop will feature presentations and short tutorials, alternating with practical exercises focused on exploring several high-level workflows. We also aim to gather feedback to understand the needs of the user community. |
Sunday, January 4 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. |
Workshop | Phoenix Convention Center, 221 C |
| Roman Galactic Bulge Time Domain Survey Data Challenge Roman’s Galactic Bulge Time Domain Survey (GBTDS) will monitor approximately 1.4 square degrees toward the Galactic bulge with a cadence of about 12 minutes during six 72-day seasons spread over the five-year prime mission. One of the primary goals of the GBTDS is to complete the census of exoplanets initiated by Kepler and TESS by using the microlensing technique to characterize the population of cold exoplanets beyond the snow line. Roman is expected to detect over 20,000 microlensing events. This workshop aims to introduce microlensing and encourage researchers to take advantage of the scientific opportunities provided by GBTDS, and in turn infuse the field with new perspectives, ideas, analysis techniques and methodologies. Registration is required. |
Sunday, January 4 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. |
Workshop | Phoenix Convention Center, 224 A |
| MAST Light Curve Similarity Search We present our proof-of-concept light curve similarity search database powered by machine learning. In this fast-searching vector database, users can choose a target or upload a light curve and quickly retrieve a desired number of “similar” targets, where similarity is determined against a lightweight feature vector computed from a convolutional neural network classifier. In this major update, we publicly release a Jupyter notebook tutorial demonstrating the database's generation and an example query, which will be viewable from the poster, and which we invite the community to explore. Finally, we invite community input for the interface, features, and object classes available through the similarity search. |
Monday, January 5 9 to 10 a.m. |
iPoster | Phoenix Convention Center, Exhibit Hall B/C/D |
| Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope Town Hall Roman is a NASA flagship mission planned for launch no earlier than September 2026. Roman will perform breakthrough science in dark energy cosmology, exoplanet microlensing, and NIR sky surveys with its Wide Field Instrument. Roman will also feature the Coronagraph Instrument (CGI), a technology demonstration that will directly image and take spectra of exoplanetary systems using several novel technologies together for the first time in space. This session will cover the status of the project and upcoming opportunities for community involvement in planning and executing the science and technology demonstration aspects of Roman. |
Monday, January 5 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. |
Town Hall | Phoenix Convention Center, 224 A |
| NASA's Habitable Worlds Observatory Representatives from NASA Headquarters and the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) Technology Maturation Project Office will share the community-driven development of the mission concept to date, avenues for future involvement, and plans for next steps. This session will also share HWO’s Community Science and Instrument Team’s (CSIT) progress in identifying the transformative science cases that guide the observatory’s design, and in defining the innovative instrument suite needed to pursue them. The CSIT will also highlight compelling science opportunities that these capabilities could enable. This session will feature an extended Q&A session for community discussion and feedback. See more HWO events. |
Tuesday, January 6 10 to 11:30 a.m. |
Special Session | Phoenix Convention Center, 224 B |
| Roman Space Telescope Proposal and Science Planning The Roman Call for Proposals includes support for analyzing survey data as well as the opportunity to propose new surveys. This splinter meeting will equip attendees with the knowledge and resources needed to prepare competitive Roman proposals. Representatives from the Roman project and the Roman Science Centers at IPAC and STScI will provide updates about the implementation of community-defined surveys, available simulations, forthcoming data products, and the proposal process itself. |
Tuesday, January 6 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. |
Splinter Meeting | Phoenix Convention Center, 121 B |
| STScI Town Hall The STScI Town Hall will serve as the centerpiece for our AAS 247 presence. We will report on the status of our existing and upcoming missions and describe new opportunities designed to advance astrophysics into the 2030s. In particular, we will present updates on Hubble and Webb operations and MAST support in light of the current budget constraints. We will describe the science opportunities afforded by Roman, include a progress report on the JWST/HST Rocky Worlds Director’s Discretionary Time program, and highlight synergies with the upcoming Habitable Worlds Observatory. We will include time for discussion. |
Wednesday, January 7 12:45 to 1:45 p.m. |
Town Hall | Phoenix Convention Center, 221 A |
| Preparing for Time-Domain Science with the Roman Space Telescope Roman is set to revolutionize time-domain astrophysics (TDA) with its combination of wide-field imaging coverage and infrared sensitivity (~27.5 mag AB). Learn about the services that will be provided by the Roman Alerts Promptly from Image Differencing (RAPID) Project Infrastructure Team, and see prototypes of RAPID services and products. This session will also provide time for community input and questions. |
Thursday, January 8 10 to 11:30 a.m. |
Special Session | Phoenix Convention Center, 226 C |
| Rocky Worlds Director’s Discretionary Time Program One of the key questions in exoplanetary science is whether rocky exoplanets orbiting M-dwarfs can retain their atmospheres, and under what conditions this is possible. The Rocky Worlds Director’s Discretionary Time (DDT) Program is a joint 250-orbit HST and 500-hour JWST project specifically designed to address this question — the largest joint HST-JWST exoplanet program to date. This session will provide an overview of the program, including the sample selection process, the development of the observing strategy, and the key challenges in scheduling, executing, and studying these observations. The program’s first observations will also be shared along with an outline for future directions and opportunities for community engagement. |
Thursday, January 8 2 to 2:10 p.m. |
Oral Session | Phoenix Convention Center, 227 C |
News Center Prefooter
Inbox Astronomy
Sign up to receive the latest news, images, and discoveries about the universe:
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google
Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Contact our News Team
Ask the News Team
Contact our Outreach Office
Ask the Outreach Office