The sounding rocket you can see above will be launched from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on December 4, and according to NASA it “will be MUSIC to the ears of aspiring and early career engineers testing new space technology on a suborbital vehicle.” That’s because the name of the payload stands for because the name of the payload stands for Multiple User Suborbital Instrument Carrier (MUSIC).
I am a long-time admirer of NASA’s creativity when it comes to creating acronyms for their missions. Here is a selection of the best.
ARTEMIS
Acceleration, Reconnection, Turbulence and Electrodynamics of the Moon’s Interaction with the Sun

BARREL
Balloon Array for Radiation belt Relativistic Electron Losses

CALIPSO
Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation satellite

CATS
Cloud-Aerosol Transport System

FUSE
Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer

GRAIL
Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory

IMAGE
Imager for Magnetopause-to-Aurora Global Exploration

IRIS
Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph

MESSENGER
Mercury, Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging

OSIRIS-REX
Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security – Regolith Explorer

SOFIA
Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy

SOHO
Solar and Heliospheric Observatory

STEREO
Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory

TRACE
Transition Region and Coronal Explorer

TWINS
Two Wide-Angle Imaging Neutral-Atom Spectrometers

WISE
Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer

All images by NASA