NASA Brings New 34-Meter Antenna Online at Deep Space Network

NASA has switched on a new 34-meter-wide (114-foot-wide) radio antenna at its Deep Space Network facility in Goldstone, California, adding capacity to the global system that keeps spacecraft exploring the solar system in touch with Earth. The new dish, called Deep Space Station 23 (DSS-23), is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and is located at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex near Barstow.

DSS-23 began operations on Aug. 3 after a testing campaign that ran from May through July, first tracking NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. It has since exchanged signals with missions including the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Psyche, Juno and Voyager 1. The antenna is the fifth to join the Deep Space Network's Aperture Enhancement Project, a program that began in 2009 to add six new 34-meter, multifrequency beam-waveguide antennas — a design that channels signals to equipment in a stable underground room instead of on the moving dish, making maintenance easier.

Construction of DSS-23 began in February 2020. Its 133-ton metal reflector framework was bolted onto the antenna's pedestal in December 2024, after which engineers installed the signal-reflecting panels and calibrated the dish to work with the rest of the network. "The biggest challenge wasn't actually constructing the antenna," said Germaine Aziz, who manages the enhancement project at JPL. "It was transforming a complex collection of mechanical, electrical, software, radio frequency, and infrastructure systems into a single, mission-ready asset."

The Deep Space Network operates giant antennas at three global sites — Goldstone, Madrid and Canberra, Australia — and supports more than 100 NASA and non-NASA missions, including astronauts aboard the International Space Station. DSS-23 is the network's fifth antenna at Goldstone, joining three other 34-meter dishes and one 70-meter dish. The enhancement project will be complete when a sixth antenna, Deep Space Station 33, comes online at Canberra in 2029, bringing the network's total number of 34-meter antennas to 13.