VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. - At the Astrotech payload processing facility at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, spacecraft technicians lower a transportation canister toward NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, for its move to Space Launch Complex 2. WISE will survey the entire sky at infrared wavelengths, creating a cosmic clearinghouse of hundreds of millions of objects which will be catalogued and provide a vast storehouse of knowledge about the solar system, the Milky Way, and the universe. Launch aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket is scheduled for Dec. 9. For additional information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/wise. Photo credit: NASA/Daniel Liberotti, VAFB KSC-2009-6544
