Building the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer: 16 Years in 3 Minutes

By Nancy Atkinson - April 3, 2013 at 5:23 PM UTC | Missions

The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on board the International Space Station released its first results today (

read about them here

) after having been in space since 2011. But this particle physics experiment was years in the making. In just 3 minutes, you can watch 16 years of building, preparing, launching and activating this detector.

Below, watch another video from NASA that provides an overview of the AMS:

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com