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- SPARCS is a small CubeSat spacecraft orbiting Earth. Launched last January, it will observe low-mass stars such as red dwarfs.
- NASA just released its first images. These first images show the spacecraft is healthy and operating normally.
- SPARCS will study the stellar environment around and on the stars, such as solar flares. This will help provide clues about the potential habitability of rocky planets orbiting the stars.
NASA’s new exoplanet mission opens its eyes
There’s a new space telescope helping to find exoplanets, and it’s only the size of a cereal box. NASA said on March 12, 2026, that the Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat (SPARCS) just took its first images of distant stars. Specifically, SPARCS is targeting low-mass stars, such as red dwarfs, with its ultraviolet camera. Red dwarf stars are the most abundant type of star in the Milky Way, yet they’re so dim that when we look at the night sky, we can’t see any with our eyes alone. And many of those dim red dwarfs are home to planetary systems.
Astronomers have found many planets orbiting red dwarf stars, including smaller rocky planets like Earth. In fact, scientists estimate that no less than 50 billion low-mass stars have at least one small rocky planet in the habitable zone. The habitable zone is the region around a star where temperatures might allow liquid water to exist on a rocky planet’s surface.
These stars are more energetic than our sun, however, with frequent flares blasting radiation into space. With this in mind, SPARCS will observe how red dwarfs affect their local systems of planets, and how that could affect their potential habitability.
SPARCS launched on January 11, 2026.
1st light for SPARCS
SPARCS, a breadbox-sized CubeSat, observed its first stars on February 6, 2026. NASA released the images to the public on March 12, after processing them. The images are in ultraviolet and near-ultraviolet light instead of regular light. This helps astronomers to see details that otherwise might be missed. SPARCS will monitor flares and sunspot activity on about 20 low-mass stars. The stars are only about 30% to 70% the mass of the sun. And yet they are home to the majority of rocky planets we know of in the habitable zone.
These first light images help to show that SPARCS is performing as expected. Principal Investigator Evgenya Shkolnik, professor of astrophysics at the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University, said:
Seeing SPARCS’ first ultraviolet images from orbit is incredibly exciting. They tell us the spacecraft, the telescope, and the detectors are performing as tested on the ground and we are ready to begin the science we built this mission to do.
SPARCS Spacecraft Delivers Its First Exoplanet Imagesastrobiology.com/2026/03/spar… #astrobiology #astronomy #exoplanet
— Astrobiology (@astrobiology.bsky.social) 2026-03-13T18:23:04.009Z
Observing 20 low-mass stars
Overall, SPARCS will observe 20 low-mass stars over the period of one year. It will monitor them in both far-ultraviolet and near-ultraviolet light simultaneously. That is something no other space observatory has done before.
Low-mass stars such as red dwarfs might be smaller and dimmer than our sun, but they are intensely active. Indeed, they unleash deadly radiation on a regular basis. This can be strong enough to shred the atmospheres of smaller planets that are too close to their stars.
Are planets of low-mass stars habitable?
This is what makes the SPARCS observations so important. They will provide valuable clues as to how much the stars’ activity can affect the potential habitability of rocky worlds orbiting them. The radiation could be bad news for planets orbiting closer to the stars. But planets farther out might fare better, however.
So while SPARCS isn’t specifically searching for exoplanets per se, it will reveal the conditions around some of them and their chances for hosting life.
Big science in small packages
SPARCS might be small, but it utilizes an impressive array of new detection, camera filter and computational processing technologies. This makes the system one of the most sensitive ever sent into space.
Shouleh Nikzad is the lead developer of the SPARCS camera (SPARCam) at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She said:
I am so excited that we are on the brink of learning about exoplanets’ host stars and the effect of their activities on the planets’ potential habitability. I’m doubly excited that we are contributing to this mission with detector and filter technologies we developed at JPL’s Microdevices Laboratory.
The new camera filters can be directly deposited onto the specially-developed UV-sensitive delta-doped detectors. Delta-doped detectors are high-performance silicon sensors (CCDs/CMOS). They are modified using molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) to grow an atomic-scale layer of dopants on the surface. Dopants are trace impurities intentionally added to semiconductor materials, in very low concentrations. They significantly alter their electrical, optical or structural properties. As Nikzad explained:
We took silicon-based detectors – the same technology as in your smartphone camera – and we created a high-sensitivity UV imager. Then we integrated filters into the detector to reject the unwanted light. That is a huge leap forward to doing big science in small packages, and SPARCS serves to demonstrate their long-term performance in space.
Assessing the habitability of distant worlds
Together, the combined technologies in SPARCS will help scientists better understand the stellar environments of low-mass stars. David Ardila, SPARCS instrument scientist at JPL, said:
The SPARCS mission brings all of these pieces together – focused science, cutting-edge detectors, and intelligent onboard processing – to deepen our understanding of the stars that most planets in the galaxy call home. By watching these stars in ultraviolet light in a way we’ve never done before, we’re not just studying flares. These observations will sharpen our picture of stellar environments and help future missions interpret the habitability of distant worlds.
Bottom line: NASA’s new exoplanet mission – called SPARCS – has taken its first light images. It will monitor low-mass stars to see if their planets could be habitable.
Via NASA/ Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Read more: Small planets are common around small stars, says new study
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