Learn about Sean Solomon and his work as a principal investigator for the MESSENGER spacecraft, which successfully entered Mercury’s orbit in March 2011, at a Hayden Planetarium event tonight at 7:30 pm. What are the latest findings about the small, mysterious planet closest to the Sun? 

The scent of evergreens, stones covered in moss, and the hum of rushing water are familiar features in many forests on Earth. But could these also describe a future landscape on Mars?

Once a staple of science fiction, terraforming—or making a planet more like Earth—is now being studied as a real possibility, as scientists research how to apply knowledge of evolution, climate, and technology to re-create the blue planet’s environment on the red planet. Visitors can learn firsthand how humans might make Mars habitable with a custom, multi-user touch table featured in the Museum’s exhibition Beyond Planet Earth: The Future of Space Exploration.

On Monday, March 5, join John Logsdon, space history and policy expert and former director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University, as he traces the factors leading to President John F. Kennedy’s decision to send astronauts to the Moon and the steps Kennedy took to turn that decision into reality. The program, hosted by Hayden Planetarium DirectorNeil deGrasse Tyson, begins at 7:30 pm and concludes with a signing of Logsdon’s book John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon. Below, Logsdon answers a few questions about Kennedy’s legacy in the field of space exploration.

On Tuesday, January 31, visit the Hayden Planetarium to see stunning images from past NASA missions combined with visualizations from the Digital Universe Atlas, a scientifically accurate 3D map of the cosmos. Starting at 6:30 pm, Emily Rice, a research scientist in the Museum’s Department of Astrophysics, and Brian Levine, an astrophysics educator in theDepartment of Education, will fly you through the solar system to see where NASA spacecraft have gone, where they might go in the future, and what we might learn about our solar system from these missions as part of NASA Missions, this month’s Astronomy Live event. Rice and Levine recently answered a few questions about their experiences in the dome and their favorite NASA milestones.

This Saturday, November 26, NASA will launch its biggest, most advanced rover yet: the one-ton Curiosity, a mobile laboratory with a two-year mission to find out whether Mars has ever supported life. See a life-sized model of Curiosity in the Museum’s new exhibition Beyond Planet Earth: The Future of Space Exploration,then explore how Mars might be transformed into a more hospitable planet with an interactive terraforming table.