A Signal Sent Skyward

On April 22, 2025—Earth Day—the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange rang not just to mark the end of trading, but to honor a new beginning beyond Earth’s atmosphere. Michael Thelen, NASA’s flight system manager for the SPHEREx mission, stood alongside fellow engineers and collaborators from JPL and BAE Systems, sending a subtle yet resonant message: humanity continues to reach.

SPHEREx, now circling the planet in low Earth orbit, is a quiet sentinel. Designed to observe over 450 million galaxies and chart the hidden signatures of water and carbon in our own Milky Way, its purpose is both scientific and elemental. It is a mission of questions—about origins, about life, about what remains after the noise fades.

The moment in Manhattan was ceremonial, even familiar. But above it, the telescope begins its work, reading the skies in a language of light unseen by human eyes. As the final bell echoed off the marble and glass of the Exchange, another soundless signal had already been sent—an orbit traced not by commerce, but by curiosity. In the measured calm of its passage, SPHEREx reminds us that wonder still has a place in our most structured hours.